


The Family Files

by starbuckscully



Category: Superfiles, Supernatural, The X-Files
Genre: Action/Adventure, Aliens, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Angels, Conspiracy, F/M, Family, M/M, Multi, Myth Arc, POV Alternating, Paranormal Investigators, Plot, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-22
Updated: 2013-07-06
Packaged: 2017-12-15 19:07:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 23,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/853017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starbuckscully/pseuds/starbuckscully
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mulder and Scully are Dean and Sam's parents and have given them a wonderful, supportive childhood (talk about AU!). With the boys now in their twenties, the family takes on paranormal cases together in their free time. Everyone is happy and enjoying Christmas together when a sudden abduction plunges them back into a world of dark conspiracy. What they find will have important implications not just for the family, but for the future of the world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. How the Aliens Stole Christmas

**Author's Note:**

> Tries to be as canon-consistent as possible given the fusion. Set post-IWTB. First four chapters rated T. Rated E to be safe for a couple of late sex scenes. I hope you enjoy!

“Mom, it’s me,” said a cheerful voice on the other end of the phone line.

“Dean! Where are you?” Scully replied.

“Almost there – just turning on to Lawrence Street. I was dropping Charlie off at the train station.”

Scully turned to Mulder, pointed at the phone and silently mouthed “five minutes.”

“Well you’d better hurry or your pie will get cold,” she said into the receiver.

“You don’t have to tell me twice! Pedal to the medal, see you in two minutes!” Dean answered.

“Dean William Scully, you will drive safely!”

“Ugh _Mom_! You know I do.”

Scully rolled her eyes and put down the phone.

“Oh were we saving that pie?” Mulder asked innocently.

Scully sent one of her trademark disapproving faces in his direction.

“Kidding!” Mulder protested. He raised his hands in mock surrender.

“I won’t be held responsible for anything that happens if you eat Dean’s pie,” she warned. She gave him an affection pat on the shoulder as she walked past him to the screen door.

She stepped out into the backyard and breathed in the cold air. Living some fifteen miles outside the city lent an almost ethereal atmosphere to times like this. The sun was low on the horizon now, lighting up the undisturbed snow in shades of deep orange. Undisturbed, that is, except for the large footprints of her younger son and the paw prints of the giddy golden retriever with whom he was tossing a Frisbee.

“Sammy! Time to come in! Dean’s almost here!” she called out.

“Okay! Just one more throw,” he yelled back. “You hear that, Queequeg? Last one!”

He released the disc and the dog went ambling happily after it.

Scully waited for them in the doorway. Queequeg jumped up on her and tried to lick her face. She shooed her down and took Sam by the arm.

“Aren’t you cold? You should wear more layers in weather like this!”

“I’m fine, Mom – warm from running.”

He leaned down to give her a hug and walked back into the house with Queequeg trailing behind.

As she pulled the door shut behind them, Scully heard the crunch of gravel and the purr of a well-tuned engine – that would be Dean coming up the driveway. He loved that “baby” so much that Scully felt like it was nearly her grandchild. She could appreciate a fine vehicle like that ’67 Impala, but it was a certain godfather by the name of John Doggett that had encouraged a love of cars in Dean, aided and abetted by their friendly neighbor and mechanic, Bobby. The thought reminded her to get out the holiday card from John, Monica, and their kids to show the boys after dinner.

“How much for the pizza?” Mulder joked as he opened the front door and took a hot food pouch and cooler from Dean.

“Room and board for the night would be good,” Dean replied with a grin.

“Don’t tell me that’s your beer-soaked sausage-cranberry stuffing,” Sam said and crinkled his nose.

“It sure is!” Dean answered. “Don’t worry, Sammy, I brought Parmesan crusted Brussels sprouts too, just for you.”

“Wrapped in bacon, no doubt.”

“Of course.”

Sam laughed and stepped forward to take his older brother in a friendly embrace. Scully caught Mulder’s eye and smiled. It warmed her heart to have the whole family together like this. Even with both boys still living nearby, it didn’t happen often enough. Dean’s job at the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and Sam’s studies at the University of British Columbia kept them both busy. With the government and school holidays starting now, they would finally have some time to spend together.

Soon Dean had dropped his bag upstairs in his old room and they settled in for Christmas Eve dinner. Dean’s additions were delicious, as always. He had been eager to help Scully in the kitchen since he was a little boy, and she was proud of how accomplished of a cook he had become.

The conversation flowed faster than the wine, everyone laughing and telling stories and rushing to catch up.

“When will you hear back about law school, Sam?” Mulder questioned.

“Anytime between now and March.”

“Have you decided on a first choice?” Scully asked.

“I’m not sure. Toronto or Osgoode, maybe, or stay at UBC - if I get in.”

“Really? With your LSAT scores, _they_ should be paying _you_ to go to law school!” Dean beamed proudly at Sam.

Sam chuckled and shrugged. “We’ll see.”

“I want to hear more about your psychology thesis later, too,” Mulder added.

“Sure. Thanks for the references to those old works, Dad,” Sam said. “They were really useful.”

“‘Old’ he says,” Mulder repeated with a look at Scully. “As in the cutting edge research from when I was at Oxford.”

“Ancient.” Scully smirked at him.

“Hey, not everybody can rewrite Einstein for their senior thesis, Mom,” Sam joked.

“Oo don’t bring up physics, son,” Mulder chided. “Your mother’s still disappointed that Dean didn’t major in it.”

“I am not!” Scully protested. “Dean would have excelled in any field he chose, and I have always wanted him to follow his interests. Besides, how can I complain about a dual degree in electronic engineering and chemical forensics?”

“Yeah, yeah, Dean the perfect son.” Sam rolled his eyes.

“I’m just glad we got him out of here before he took apart every clock, radio, and electronic device in the house,” Mulder injected.

“I always put them back together!” Dean protested.

“Oh yes, with improvements,” Scully said with a twinkle in her eye. “You know, when the microwave-slash-EMF detector beeps I never know if it’s the popcorn or a poltergeist.”

They all laughed and Scully took a moment to look around at her happy little family. She wondered how long it would be before the circle extended to five or six at the table, and some little ones after that.

“Let’s give your brother a break, then, Sam, and hear some more about you. How are things with Jess?” she asked.

“She’s doing well,” Sam replied. “She’s considering a few job offers for after graduation. There’s a non-profit in Vancouver that does advocacy work for children’s education that she’s very interested in.”

“You would stay at UBC then?” Mulder prompted.

“Umm, I want to, but, uh… I think she should have some say in the matter. So…” Sam looked suddenly bashful. He pushed around the Brussels sprout on his plate. He cleared his throat. “I’m going to ask her to marry me.”

“Oh that’s wonderful!” Scully exclaimed.

“Congrats, Sammy! She’s a keeper!” Dean said with a broad smile.

“Ah getting tied down so young,” Mulder said slyly and leaned back in his chair. “Before you know it, twenty-some years will have passed and you’ll still be stuck with her and a couple of overgrown rugrats to boot.” He winked at Scully and got one of her amused-but-not-going-to-indulge-you looks in response.

“She hasn’t said ‘yes’ yet,” Sam reminded them. “So please don’t say anything to anyone.”

“She will,” Scully told him.

“ _Mooom,_ ” Sam drew out the word with exaggerated exasperation.

“Women’s intuition,” she insisted.

“More like everyone can see she’s madly in love with you,” Dean offered.

Sam shrugged but smiled.

“Do you need help picking out a ring?” Scully asked.

“I haven’t really looked yet,” Sam replied.

“You know, I have some of my mother’s jewelry in a box upstairs,” Mulder offered. “You could look through it and see if you like something.”

“Yeah, thanks, Dad – that would be really nice.”

Sam’s interest in her mother-in-law’s heirlooms pleased Scully. Sam was a sensitive boy in many ways, but Dean had always been the one who showed more sentimentality regarding family.

“Not to put any pressure on you,” Scully said as she turned to Dean. “But do you have any news for us?”

“Like do I have some secret lover that you’ll only find out about when we return from eloping to Vegas?” Dean joked.

“You think you have secrets?” Mulder played along. “Don’t forget our time at the FBI uncovering far deeper conspiracies than you could ever pull off.”

“Boys, please,” Scully interrupted. “What about Lisa? Or Aaron?”

Dean had carried on plenty of relationships over the years, but they never seemed to last. She didn’t want to be the kind of parent who meddled in her children’s relationships – she just wanted so much for Dean to find someone with whom he could be happy.

“They’re fine, but there’s nothing going on there,” Dean said between mouthfuls.

“Anyone new then?” she pressed.

“Nope.”

Scully held in a sigh. She had worried that life would be harder for Dean ever since she found some men’s underwear catalogs and _Playgirl_ mixed in with _Busty Asian Beauties_ and _Celebrity Skin_ – the latter pilfered, no doubt, from Mulder’s collection – while cleaning under his bed when he was a teenager. She had waited for him to tell her in his own time, which he did, eventually. Fortunately, the world had changed a lot since she was growing up, and Dean had not had to struggle the way she had feared. All the same, she was relieved that she had not forced the still-regressive Catholic Church on her children. More than that, she was thankful that Mulder had proven such a good father and role model, never presuming anything about his sons or expecting them to fall into traditional roles of gender or sexuality. Well, that shouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone – there was hardly anything “traditional” about Mulder in the first place!

“That’s alright, froggie.” Dean grimaced at his mother’s use of her childhood nickname for him, a reference to a Three Dog Night song she used to sing to him in place of a lullaby.

“How’s Charlie?” she asked.

Charlie was Dean’s dearest friend and Scully was quite found of her. She would have loved to have her for a daughter-in-law, but as Charlie was only interested in women, Scully was content to treat her like a daughter in spirit.

“She’s good,” Dean answered. He seemed relieved for the conversation to move beyond his love life and recounted some stories about their adventures in “live action role play” and a sci-fi convention they had attended recently.

“I hope you didn’t go around telling the kids that ‘monsters are real’ and ‘you _should_ be scared of the dark’ again?” Sam asked.

 “Nah, though that reminds me,” Dean picked up. “Remember that case I found that looked like it might be a wendigo?”

Scully nodded. While working at the CSIS, Dean had become very good at scouting out unusual and possibly supernatural cases – what would have been classed as “X-Files” back at the FBI. When something didn’t quite add up, he’d tip off the rest of the family. Often Mulder would do some digging and try to get attached to the case as a consultant, and steer any autopsies they needed her way. If that didn’t work, well, Scully had come to accept that some things had to be done off the books. She loved the teaching and official consulting parts of her job, but she did miss being in the field at times and enjoyed their unconventional family activities more than she was willing to let on.

“No dice,” Dean continued. “Turned out to be the human-type of monster, just some son of bitch kidnapping girls and chaining them in his basement. At least we caught him.”

“I still think that potential ghost activity is worth checking out,” Sam mentioned. “New Year’s Eve, every year.”

Even though he was busy with school, Sam continued to scour the papers and read up on lore when he could. He even helped his father run a blog about conspiracies and the paranormal – a kind of 21st century heir to _The Lone Gunmen_ magazine.

“At least it’s not _Christmas_ Eve,” Scully said with a knowing look at Mulder.

“Did I ever tell you boys the story of how I stole your mothers keys so she would spend Christmas Eve staking out a haunted house with me?” Mulder asked.

“YES!” Dean and Sam replied in unison.

“Not gonna humor your old man with his boring old stories, huh? Okay,” Mulder shrugged and pushed back his empty plate.

Scully put her hand on his. “Let’s do presents!” she suggested.

 ~*~

An hour later, Scully’s living room was covered in ribbons and wrapping paper that Queequeg was happily tearing to shreds. The boys were arguing over whether to watch _Plan 9 from Outer Space_ or _Caddyshack._ (They might be bored of Mulder’s stories, but they never seemed to tire of his favorite movies.) She leaned back and closed her eyes.

“Don’t fall asleep yet!” Mulder said with a nudge.

“Why not?” she asked without opening her eyes.

“One more present.”

Scully raised an eyebrow skeptically and opened one eye. Sure enough, Mulder had one more, small present in his hands.

“Better not be more alien implant earrings,” she said grumpily as she sat back up.

“No, but why don’t you put on those cerulean blue ones I got you?”

“Aquamarine!” Scully corrected.

They were lovely gemstone studs, actually. All the gifts had been thoughtful. She appreciated the beautiful painting from her sons of Captain Ahab launching a harpoon at Moby Dick. They had found it at a student art show and said it reminded them of her father, their grandfather. The briefcase she and Mulder had gotten for Sam and the stylish black jacket for Dean seemed to have gone over well too. Mulder was eager to try out the telescope she had picked out, though apparently more excited at the moment to watch a selection from the Ed Wood box set the boys had given him. (She had a feeling that _Plan 9_ would win out.) It made her happy to see the brothers exchange gifts on their own too – some kind of chainmail from Sam for Dean’s LARPing and an obscure book Dean had tracked down for Sam. But what was in that last little wrapped box?

“Who wants to do the honors?” Mulder asked.

Queequeg barked loudly and wagged her tail.

“No, not you, you big mutt.” Mulder paused. “How about… Dean?”

Dean took the gift curiously and unwrapped it.

“Awesome! Thanks Dad!!” he exclaimed.

“What is it?” Sam asked, leaning over and trying to get a look.

“Six tickets to see the Seattle Mariners play against the Atlanta Braves,” Dean answered as he raised them up for everyone else to see.

“Baseball?” Scully asked.

“Very good, Scully!” Mulder answered, seemingly impressed that she recognized the teams. He poked her gently in the hip.

“Maybe you can finally explain to me the scientific nature of the ‘whammy’” she said.

“Enough with your gross inside jokes,” Dean complained.

“Why are there six tickets?” Sam asked.

“It’s for me, your mother, and her bridge club,” Mulder replied dryly.

Sam gave him an expression that was a perfect imitation of one of Scully’s own.

“Okay, okay,” Mulder relented. “One for Jess and one for whomever Dean wants to bring. It’s not till the summer, so you have some time to find someone - ”

“Or you can bring Charlie, of course,” Scully butted in.

“Yeah, okay,” Dean said somewhat sheepishly. “I don’t think sports are really her thing, but um, we’ll see. Thanks.”

“It’s a wonderful idea, Mulder,” Scully said.

“Better than an Apollo keychain or a family outing to a secret Air Force base?” he asked.

Scully just rolled her eyes and patted him on the shoulder.

“Would you tall boys hang up my painting?” she asked.

Her sons jumped up and started assembling the nails, hammer, and level.

“Where do you want it?” Sam asked.

“How about…” Scully paused to think for a moment. “I think right here over the side table?”

They lifted the painting and Scully stepped back to evaluate its position.

“A little to the left,” she instructed. “No, no… too far. Now, up a little? Nevermind, down was better…”

“This is heavier than it looks!” Dean griped.

The painting was behind protective glass and in a thick frame, so he probably wasn’t just whining. Scully declared that the position was fine and they marked the spot with a pencil before hammering in a couple of nails.

“All set?” Sam asked as they arranged the painting on the wall.

“Perfect,” Scully replied.

The boys let go and suddenly one corner slipped off its support. The heavy painting began to topple to the ground, then stopped, suspended in mid-air. Everyone froze staring at it. After a moment, as if it had been released from an invisible hand, the painting fell the last short distance to the ground. It clamored loudly but did not shatter.

“DAMNIT SAM!” Dean bellowed. “You know you can’t do that! What if other people were here besides the family??”

“I’m sorry, I know, I’m sorry,” Sam held up his hands and backed away.

Scully exchanged looks with Mulder.

“Dean,” she said softly and walked up to put a hand on his arm.

Dean looked down at his mother and calmed a bit.

“He _is_ right,” Mulder said to Sam. “It’s dangerous to lose control like that.”

“I wasn’t thinking, I, I - ” Sam struggled to explain. “I just reacted.”

Scully was torn between wanting to reassure her son and her worry for his safety. She decided on the former for the moment.

“I’m sure he just let his guard down because subconsciously he’s comfortable and knows that he’s at home with us,” she offered.

Sam sent her a grateful look. Mulder and Dean did not seem appeased.

“Have you done that in front of anyone else?” Mulder demanded.

“No, of course not!” Sam insisted.

“Dean?” Mulder inquired.

“What? No, I’ve never seen him use his… whatever, outside home,” Dean replied. “But I can’t be there all the time anymore, Dad. He’s 22 years old!”

“I’m telling you, I’m fine,” Sam interrupted. “I have the situation under control.”

“Well, I think we should fix the nail and hang my painting back up,” Scully stated calmly. “Then how about dessert and _Plan 9 From Outer Space_?”

“No, _Caddyshack_!” Dean argued.

“Sorry, son, three-to-one,” Mulder interjected.

Scully could feel the tension in the room dissipating.

“Would some pecan pie make it up to you?” she asked.

Dean grinned. “You bet.”

“Too bad I ate it all before you got here,” Sam said seriously.

“You better not have!” Dean threatened. “Not if you know what’s good for you!”

“Nah, he’s kidding,” Mulder joined in. “ _I_ ate the pie.”

“Okay, boys,” Scully interrupted. “Stop arguing and set up the movie or _I’ll_ eat the whole pie without you.”

She smiled at them and went to fetch the dessert. Queequeg trailed at her heels, hoping for something tasty in the kitchen. As she sliced the pie she could hear in the other room Mulder insisting to Dean that the movie was a “classic” followed by the reply that it was “classically bad.” Sam asked how many times his dad had seen the movie now. She couldn’t hear the reply – probably he had whispered it so she wouldn’t know and tell him how sad it was – but she did hear the incredulous gasps followed by laughter. The incident with Sam had given her pause for a moment, but things were already getting back to normal.

She arranged the slices on dessert plates and carried them back to the living room on a tray.

“Aw Mom, you’re the best!” Dean’s eyes lit up and a huge grin spread across his face.

Scully smiled and handed him a plate.

“You’re just saying that to get the biggest slice,” Sam teased.

“Is that so?” Scully asked and pretended to take the tray away.

“No, of course you’re the best,” Sam said affectionately as he took his plate.

Mulder approached to pick up his dessert and gave her a light kiss on the lips.

“Merry Christmas, Scully,” he whispered.

She ran a finger through the whipped cream on her pie and dabbed it on his nose. He laughed and kissed her again, rubbing his nose against hers to share the mess. She could feel the boys rolling their eyes at their antics.

“All right, all right,” she said, and pushed Mulder back.

She took her slice of pie too and they all settled in for a classic B movie marathon to end the nearly perfect Christmas Eve.

~*~ 

Hours later Scully awoke to violent shaking in the house and bright, flashing blue and red lights streaming in the window. A loud humming noise vibrated in her ears and chest.

“What’s going on?” she asked Mulder anxiously, unable to mask the fear in her voice.

“I don’t know,” he replied. “But I really hope it’s just a prank by the boys.”

He didn’t look convinced. They both sprang out of bed and Scully reached for her firearm.

“Stay back,” he warned her as he opened the bedroom door slowly.

Running footsteps upstairs added to the cacophony.

“Shit,” Mulder cursed and swung the door open in abandon and ran out into the hallway.

“Mulder, wait!” Scully called after him.

By the time she got to the stairs, the lights and noise suddenly stopped. An eerie silence replaced it.

“Scully!!” Mulder called out from upstairs.

“Mulder!” she replied and sprinted up the steps.

Dean was standing in the hallway in his pajamas, doubled over and panting.

“What happened?” she asked.

“He’s gone,” Dean replied.

“What do you mean?” Mulder asked.

“Sammy,” Dean said forlornly. “They took him…”

“Who? Who took him?” Mulder demanded.

“Who do you think?” Dean replied. “The goddamn aliens.”

Mulder ran into Sam’s room and threw back the covers on the bed - nothing. He went to the open window and leaned out to let out a yell of anger.

This was Scully’s worst nightmare come to life. The fear she’d had since Sammy was just a baby and started to show… unusual abilities had been realized. Back then Mulder had been on the run and she had been unsure how to act or where to turn. John and Monica had been wonderful friends to her, helping to take care of four-year-old Dean and trying to discover the truth behind Sam’s origins. She had thought she would never be able to conceive again after the abduction, so when she became pregnant with their second, it felt like a miracle. She was thrilled that Dean would have a younger sibling and vowed to name it after Mulder’s long-lost sister, either Samantha or Samuel, depending on the gender. At first, Sam seemed like a normal baby, but when his mobile started to turn on its own and artifacts flew across the room – she couldn’t lie to herself anymore.

She had come _so close_ to giving up Sam for adoption. But the love she saw in Dean’s eyes for his little brother as she put him in the car to take him away was too heartbreaking. She couldn’t do it. Now she saw that heartbreak in her son’s eyes and wondered again if she had made a mistake all those years ago. If she had given him away to strangers, would they have been able to find him now? Had her selfishness endangered her beloved child?

“We’ll find him,” she said aloud, more confidently than she felt. “Just like any other case.”

“It’s not any other case,” Mulder said despondently.

“We’ve both come back from abduction,” she continued. “It can be done. It’s been a long time since we’ve been involved in this sort of case, but we have contacts, experience – we can do it, for Sammy.”

Dean came up and hugged her tight. She couldn’t help the tears that fell onto his bright flannel shirt. Soon Mulder turned from the window and came over to embrace them both.

“You’re right,” he said softly. “I have to believe. Sammy is out there, and we _will_ find him.”

 


	2. Up Crickmer Without a Paddle

_Three… two… one… HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!_

Cheers erupted from New York City to the tv in the living room, but Dean didn’t feel like celebrating. It had been an entire week since Sam was abducted and they were no closer to finding him. He closed his laptop and glared at the giddy revelers laughing and dancing four thousand kilometers away.

“Nothing in the local papers?” his dad asked.

“Not unless you consider Chilliwack winning the Christmas light competition a paranormal event,” Dean replied.

“Maybe they’re signaling the mothership in flashing red and green,” his dad joked without smiling. He took off his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose.

His mother entered the room and leaned against the doorframe with her arms crossed.

“I have some small good news,” she said.

They looked up at her hopefully.

“I just got off the phone with John and Monica,” she continued. “They handled the poltergeist situation that… Sammy identified.”

Dean nodded and looked away. It was hard to care about some holiday haunting case with so much weighing on them now.

“Did they have any leads…?” his dad asked.

His mom shook her head.

They fell into a glum silence broken only by the tinny pop music emanating from the tv.

A notification chime prompted his dad to pull his phone out of his pocket and check a message.

“Finally!” he exclaimed.

“What? What is it?” Dean asked.

“The three stooges got back to me.”

His mother raised an eyebrow, waiting for him to go on.

“They have information and will discuss it online in…” his dad looked at his watch. “…five minutes. Dean, open up the computer again and go to this address.”

He handed over the phone showing a text message from an unidentified number. They all crowded around the laptop and Dean typed in the url. It took them to a page that was completely blank except for a command line prompting him to enter a username.

“Uhhh… how about John Bonham?” he suggested.

“Say you’re George Hale,” his dad instructed.

“Whatever you say, Dad,” Dean replied.

> _George Hale has entered the conversation._

“Who are we talking to?” he asked.

“You remember my friends I told you about, the ‘Lone Gunmen’?”

“I thought they were still in hiding?”

“They are. I’ve been trying to reach them for days.”

“Any enemies they had must be long gone by now,” his mother said exasperatedly. “Surely the need to maintain the illusion of their deaths has passed.”

“Try telling them that,” his dad replied with a shrug. “These guys could uncover an assassination plot in a church picnic.”

> _Arthur Clarke has entered the conversation._
> 
> _Isaac Asimov has entered the conversation._
> 
> _Robert Heinlein has entered the conversation._

“There they are,” his dad noted. “Pass me the keyboard.”

Dean slid the laptop across the table and leaned over to see the screen.

> George Hale: _Are you boys having a LAN party?_
> 
> George Hale: _Which of you is which?_
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _lan party so 20th cent lolz_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _You know it is too dangerous to reveal our identities._
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _is your little lady skeptic with you? send her my affections ;)_
> 
> George Hale: _Right. So, ‘Arthur’ Langly, ‘Isaac’ Byers, and ‘Robert’ Frohike –_
> 
> George Hale: _Let’s cut the crap. You said you had information?_
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _major party foul mulder_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _You are fortunate we have taken measures to encrypt this conversation._
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _now that’s out of the bag maybe we can do a video chat? ::waggles eyebrows::_
> 
> George Hale: _Keep your pants on, Frohike._
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _This is serious. The U.S. nuclear submarine Jimmy Carter is currently tapping into undersea fiber optic cables to monitor all Internet communications._
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _yeah u wouldn’t want 2 bcome next bradley manning_
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _you think they don’t know where every fugitive is? from assange to snowden (and who says i’m wearing pants?)_
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _theres prolly drones targeting them rn_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _Don’t assume that your Canadian status protects you from the long reach of the NSA._
> 
> George Hale: _Ok consider me thoroughly in fear for my life. Information?_
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _i hacked n2 lis satellite_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _That’s the Lightning Imaging Sensor._
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _your ufo gives off a heat signature at the moment of abduction within the range detected by the satellite instrument_
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _we can id ur house dur event & search 4 matching spectra_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _We were able to identify twelve instances within 200 km over the past two weeks._
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _the abductions are following a circular pattern with a decreasing radius_
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _theyre taking the hobbits to isengard_
> 
> George Hale: _English._
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _The spiral pattern is centered on Mount Crickmer, near Devil’s Lake and northwest of Fort Langley._
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _no relation_
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _there are corroborating reports of increasing ufo sightings in the past month in that sector_
> 
> George Hale: _You think they are taking the abductees to a central location? Why?_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _The smaller craft may be rendezvousing with the leader?_
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _u need 2 b ready 2 intercept asap_
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _based on the frequency of events, it seems likely they will convene tomorrow night at crickmer_
> 
> George Hale: _Thanks._
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _I just wish we had more for you._
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _we’re v sorry about sam_
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _our condolences to the family_
> 
> George Hale: _He’s not gone yet._
> 
> George Hale: _How can we contact you again if we need more information?_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _We will contact you._
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _we’ll be in touch_
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _peace out dudes_
> 
> _Isaac Asimov has left the conversation._
> 
> _Robert Heinlein has left the conversation._
> 
> _Arthur Clarke has left the conversation._

Dean gaped at the screen. “That’s it?”

“Damnit!” his dad swore. “Paranoid bastards.”

“We did get some solid intel, though,” Dean offered.

“How reliable do you think this lead is, Mulder?” his mother asked, a hint of skepticism already in her voice.

“It’s not unreasonable,” he answered. “I have several X-Files that record such characteristic high temperatures at the moment of abduction, likely from the energy required to maintain the beam - ”

“How are you so sure that it’s extraterrestrial? For all we know, this could be part of a top-secret military program – the men who took me years ago come back to study the results of their experiment!”

“Then how do you explain the flash over our house in the satellite imagery?”

“I don’t know! Experimental aircraft? An error in the satellite retrieval algorithm? Actual lightning??”

“There were no storms that night!”

“You don’t know that!”

“Why is it so hard for you to believe, even now after all these years? When your own _son_ is in danger!”

“I’m just trying to look at this logically instead of emotionally! If we leap to extreme possibilities we may well miss the more probable explanations that would lead us to him!”

“GUYS! GUYS! ENOUGH!” Dean yelled to interrupt them.

His parents stopped shouting and turned to look at him.

“Sorry,” his dad said.

His mother re-crossed her arms. “It _is_ worth investigating, at least,” she admitted.

 “Mount Crickmer is about fifty kilometers from here,” Dean continued. “Let’s get our gear and go check it out.”

“One of us should stay in case Sam returns,” his dad suggested.

“If he comes back, won’t he just call?” Dean asked.

“He may be injured, or trauma could have induced amnesia,” his mother replied. “I’ll stay here. But you boys be _very careful_.”

She took Dean’s head in her hands and looked at him seriously. “I can’t lose another son,” she said. She stood up on her tiptoes and kissed his forehead.

“I’ll be careful,” he promised.

She went over to his dad and took him by the hand. They gazed into one another’s eyes for a long time.

Dean turned and went upstairs to pack. 

~*~

The next night, Dean sat in his car with his dad, eyeing the peak of the mountain some thousand meters up through long-range binoculars.

“Any signs of activity?” his dad asked.

“Nothing yet,” he replied.

His dad was busy looking over a trail map they had picked up from a local ranger station.

“Are you sure this is the right place? Why not one of the other mountains?” Dean asked. He tried to hide his rising anxiety, but didn’t think he was successful.

“We can’t be certain,” his dad replied.

Was there an edge of something in his dad’s voice? Had his dad become colder to him since the abduction, or was it just Dean’s imagination? All his life, his dad had impressed upon him the importance of looking after his younger brother. He had lost his own sister, Sam’s namesake Samantha, to abduction when they were kids. He had raised Dean to take responsibility from an early age, to be constantly vigilant for his sibling’s welfare – especially considering Sam’s unusual abilities, which would surely expose him to extra dangers. And now, he had failed – failed to protect Sam, failed as an older brother, failed his father. It was hard to even look him in the eye now. The only thing that kept Dean going was the drive to bring Sam back home, that hope that he could still make things right.

“The Lone Gunmen wouldn’t be able to confidently isolate this specific mountain with so few data points,” his dad continued. “But it’s the southernmost in the range and has a broad rocky peak, consistent with other X-Files – it _is_ the most likely choice, and right now it’s all we’ve got.”

“Let’s go up there now and wait,” Dean announced and reached to turn the key in the ignition.

“Wait a minute,” his dad cautioned and put a hand on his arm to stop him. “According to this, we can drive most of the way, but the last kilometer is accessible by foot only.”

He opened up the map and pointed to where the road ended.

“There are two trails leading to the peak – one ascends the west face with a series of steep switchbacks, the other winds around to the east and north and crosses Perdition Canyon.”

Dean squinted at the map. The topography indicated a strenuous path in the first trail, though the second was much longer. A swinging bridge was marked with a series of check marks over what appeared to be a very deep gully – at least a 500 meter drop, if he was reading the lines correctly.

“I’ll take the switchbacks,” he offered.

“No, you won’t,” his dad argued. “I may be old, but my knees are in good shape. I need you to make good time on this longer path. Besides, I had enough of heights and chases when I was dangling off a cable car on Skyland Mountain.”

Dean figured that was fair enough.

“If this works, we’ll arrive at the peak from opposite directions,” he continued. “Separating is our best chance to cover ground. If you have a shot, don’t hesitate.”

Dean looked at his father and nodded. He cranked the car and started the ascent.

Shortly before midnight, Dean stepped gingerly onto the rickety wooden bridge connecting the ridge he was standing on to the peak of Mount Crickmer. The bridge shook and moaned under his weight.

“More like Mount Creakmer,” he muttered to himself and stepped back onto solid ground.

He took out his binoculars and looked across Perdition Canyon to the broad, rocky summit – still completely dark and quiet. There were not many options for shelter. He estimated the bridge to be about a hundred meters in length – not short, but not so long that he couldn’t cross it in a sprint when the time came. He sat down on a boulder to wait.

Suddenly the wind began to pick up. He leapt to his feet and scanned the sky. About a dozen small lights approached from all directions. He started to run.

The bridge swung violently in the storm. When one particularly strong burst of air rammed into the side of the bridge like a wrecking ball, it was all Dean could do to cling to the rope railings and keep from falling. When he steadied himself, he looked up and saw that the summit of the mountain was illuminated. A small group of people had appeared in the middle of the flashing lights. They all stood motionless, looking upwards.

“Sammy!” Dean called. He let go of the ropes and ran with abandon to cross the remaining distance.

As soon as he reached the other side, an unexpected blast knocked him to the ground. He fell forward on his chest and struggled to breathe. A loud whirring noise like he had heard the night of Sam’s abduction, only amplified so much louder, shook the ground and resonated in his ribcage. With effort he forced himself to roll over onto his back.

What he saw in the sky overhead nearly took his breath away again – twelve triangular aircraft buzzing about in impossible formations, and above them a much larger saucer-shaped UFO. A blinding bright spotlight emanated from the center of the ship down to the ground. A tractor beam?

With a groan, Dean pushed himself up off the ground. He stumbled slowly toward the group of abductees. Was that tall figure in the distance his brother?

Suddenly Dean found he could go no further. It felt as though an invisible wall separated him from his brother and the other abductees. He screamed in frustration and banged his fist against the unseen barrier in vain. On the other side, he could see his father in a similar situation, struggling and trying to ram through the wall of air.

“SAAAMMM!!!” Dean yelled at the top of his lungs, trying to get his brother’s attention.

Dean saw Sam slowly lower his head and turn toward him. When their eyes locked, a chill went through Dean’s whole body – there was no recognition there, just blankness.

A moment later, Sam was gone. They were all gone. Dean blinked in disbelief. Before he had a moment to react, the beam disappeared and a sound like a sonic boom erupted above him. Something threw him up into the air and backwards tens of meters. He fell hard and rolled down the shallow slope toward the edge of the canyon.

In a panic, Dean tried to grab at anything that he passed –scraggly vegetation, bruising rocks – to slow his careening. Finally he knocked into the rope braces of the wooden bridge. His momentum carried him a few more meters and he rolled right over the side of the bridge.

His fingers clung desperately to the wooden planks of the bridge base. He looked back toward Crickmer but he was too far now to reach the precipice. The wind whirled around him, shaking the bridge violently and swinging his body underneath. He knew he couldn’t hold on much longer.

_So this was it, the end. He was going to die right here, tonight._

Suddenly a man appeared on the bridge, kneeling. He reached out and grabbed Dean at the shoulder. Dean’s fingers slipped and he grasped the mysterious man’s arm to catch himself. He looked up and met the most beautiful, intense blue eyes he had ever seen.

_An angel? He must be dead. An angel was taking him to heaven. Or was he destined for somewhere else…?_

The man lifted up Dean easily. Dean felt his feet land on solid ground and the wind and noise immediately died out.

The man let go of Dean’s arm but remained standing uncomfortably close, staring at him. Dean stepped back and bumped into something. He looked back and saw his car. He was in the parking lot at the trailhead again. _So, not dead._

“Who are you?” he asked his rescuer.

“I am Castiel, angel of the Lord,” the man replied.

“Bullshit,” Dean spat out.

Castiel tilted his head and squinted at Dean, analyzing him.

“A moment ago you assumed that I was an angel, so why now do you not believe?” he asked.

Dean was taken aback.

“Okay, one, stay out of my head,” he warned sternly. “Two, there’s no such thing! What are you really? How did you know what I was thinking? And why did you save me?”

“You don’t think you deserve to be saved?” Castiel asked, ignoring the first two questions.

“What?” Dean tried to step back again, forgetting that the car was still there. This conversation was beyond surreal. “No, yes… I don’t know! What about Sam? Why didn’t you save him instead?”

Dean stared back, challenging.

“Because God willed it,” Castiel replied even. “We have plans for you.”

“For me?” Dean repeated, incredulous.

“Yes,” Castiel answered.

Dean let out an exasperated sigh and threw up his hands.

“Unless your plan is helping me get Sam back, I don’t give a shit about your plans!” he yelled. “You don’t understand! He was my responsibility! Looking after Sammy was my job! And I failed…”

Dean trailed off as it became more difficult to talk. He swallowed hard. He would not cry in front of this random stranger – angel of the Lord or not.

Castiel studied Dean for a long time before speaking again.

“You each have a role to play,” he said slowly. “Sam’s path lays another way. Yours is with me.”

Dean expected that the beautiful man did not intend for that to sound the way it did, but it made his heartbeat pick up all the same.

“And what are these ‘roles’?” he asked.

Castiel looked at him for another moment then vanished.

“What the hell?!” Dean shouted into the emptiness.

_What kind of creature could just disappear like that? Was he really an angel? No being had any right to be that attractive. God, what an inappropriate thought! Focus!_

“Dean!”

Dean looked up to see his father running up the west trail toward him. The memory of his failure to recover his brother came crashing down over him.

“Dad…” he started. “I’m so sorry…”

As his dad caught up to him Dean braced for a chewing out, but was surprised when he took him in a tight hug instead.

“I thought I’d lost you,” his dad said, still not letting go.

“It’s all my fault,” Dean confessed. He was unable to hold back the tears any longer. “I should have been faster, I should have been more vigilant, I, I – I know I let you down. I couldn’t take care of him…”

“What are you talking about?” his dad asked, pulling back to hold Dean by the shoulders and look him in the eye. “This isn’t your fault.”

“But you always told me, since Aunt Samantha…”

“No,” his dad spoke seriously. “No, listen to me, son. I’m sorry I was so hard on you. I should never have put my regrets onto you. This isn’t about Samantha, this is about Sam – you’ve done all that you could. And we _will_ still get him back. Do you understand?”

Dean didn’t trust himself to answer so he just nodded. He felt as if a giant weight had been lifted off of his shoulders.

“How did you get back here so fast anyways?” his dad asked.

Dean chuckled. “That’s a story even _you_ won’t believe.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *John Bonham was the drummer for Led Zeppelin (ref. SPN episode 1x11); George Hale was a brilliant but psychologically troubled astronomer (ref. TXF episode 2x01); and Clarke, Asimov, & Heinlein were "The Big Three" science fiction authors of the 20th century.


	3. Comparative Religion

“An angel of the Lord?” Scully asked, skeptical.

“That’s what he said,” Dean replied with a shrug.

“In a suit and trench coat?”

“Yeah, he dressed like Dad at the FBI twenty years ago.”

“Hey!” Mulder interjected. “At least I wore my ties facing forward – and very stylish ones they were, too.”

Scully rolled her eyes, but remembering her shoulder pads and oversized pantsuits from the era, she knew she was in no position to judge. “And you say he just… vanished?”

“Like a donut at a cop convention,” Dean quipped.

“Was he fully corporeal?” Mulder asked. “It could have been a spirit. Or a tulpa? Or one of the aliens beaming back aboard?”

“Hold on,” Scully interrupted. “You’re discounting the possibility that he actually was who he said he was – an angel. Why?”

“ _Because they don’t exist?_ ” Mulder replied in an exasperated and sing-song-y voice, clearly trying to imitate Scully.

“By your own standards, you must admit the existence of angels is a reasonable plausibility,” she continued, ignoring his mockery. “There are more recorded first-hand accounts of angels than of any other phenomena you track in the X-Files.”

“You mean the Bible?” he asked.

“Yes,” she answered. “Why wouldn’t that count?”

“The reliability of a patchwork two-thousand year old anthology put together by not entirely unbiased fourth century Roman priests is questionable, to say the least.”

“And _The National Enquirer_ isn’t??”

“So the Gospels are full of references to the Archangel Colombo?”

“The idea of angels as blond Caucasians in white robes playing the harp is a cultural construction that is not textually based. The angels of the Bible are fearsome. They are soldiers of the Lord - ”

“Who look like Ralph Nader in a rainstorm?”

“Why are you so focused on the wrinkled suit? You’re avoiding the crux of the issue because you don’t want to face the implications!”

“What implications? Why would _angels_ be involved in an alien abduction?”

“I don’t know! God works in - ”

“If you say ‘mysterious ways’, so help me - ”

“OKAY ENOUGH!” Dean interrupted.

Scully dropped what she had been about to say, but continued to glare at Mulder, fuming.

“This isn’t getting us anywhere,” her son continued. “The important thing is – what’s our next step? How do we get Sam back?”

The reminder that this was not just an academic discussion was sobering. Scully tried to refocus on the issue at hand.

“Did you notice anything about the abductees, Dean?” Mulder asked.

Dean shook his head. “What do you mean?”

“They were the same age,” Mulder continued. “If I had to guess, I’d say they were all roughly 22, like Sam.”

“That’s curious,” Scully commented. “What would it mean if they were all born in the same year?”

“Maybe their births occurred under similar circumstances,” Mulder said cautiously. “Perhaps their mothers are also abductees.”

That was a disturbing thought. Sam’s “miraculous” birth after she had been declared infertile had been a nagging concern in the dark recesses of her mind for over two decades now. Perhaps it was time to find out more about his origins.

“Can we find these women?” Dean asked. “What about the satellite?”

“I got an unsigned email from our illustrious fathers of modern science fiction after they logged off the other night,” Mulder said. “It has a map marking the other abductions.”

“We can log in to the CSIS database and match the locations with missing persons reports,” Scully noted.

“I’ll get right on it,” Dean said.

He left to get his laptop.

Scully reflexively reached up to touch her necklace. She fiddled with the small gold cross as she pondered this new development. When she looked up, she saw that Mulder had been watching her. With tensions running high, it was not surprising that some of their old disagreements were springing up again. But now was no time to be at odds. She reached out to squeeze his hand. He nodded slightly, understanding.

~*~

“Did Max manifest any unusual abilities as a child?” Scully asked, as she set down her cup of tea on the coffee table in a very Martha Stewart drawing room.

“What do you mean ‘unusual’?” Max’s mother asked.

“Telekinesis, psychic visions,” Mulder started to explain. “Predivinations of events that would later unfold, unexplained coincidences, extreme strength or physical prowess outside the realm of human – ”

“Are you crazy?” the mother interrupted.

“I know how this sounds,” Scully jumped in. “Understand that we are on your side. We just want to help you get Max back.”

“Well…” she looked to the windows, nervously. “There _were_ some odd things when Max was a baby…”

Scully listened as Max’s mother detailed a story not unlike her own: baby toys that moved on their own, headaches in adolescence, a display of inhuman strength when he rescued the family dog from under a car, even a vision warning against taking a scheduled flight that ended up going down over the Pacific. When prompted, she confirmed that she had experienced unexplained missing time some years prior to Max’s conception as well. Scully had heard versions of the same story in two other living rooms that afternoon. It was all chillingly familiar.

The sun was setting as they walked down the sidewalk leaving Max’s house. Mulder put a hand on her shoulder.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

“Yes,” she answered quickly. “I’m fine. I just want to know what it all means.”

“I wish I knew. Let’s see what Dean found out.”

As if on cue, the 67 Impala pulled up to the curb and their son got out.

“Same story with the Leungs,” he announced. “Mom went missing for months, reappeared without explanation, thought she’d never have children, then a few years later superbaby pops out.”

“Same here,” Mulder commented. “Should we move on to the next homes? I’m not convinced we’ll learn anything new.”

“You must cease your investigations,” a deep voice called out from behind them.

Scully turned around to see an attractive young man with dark brown hair and light blue eyes. He was wearing a slightly oversized mid-quality suit with a battered tan coat. Could it be…?

“Who are you?” she asked.

“I’m the one who gripped Dean tight and raised him from Perdition,” he answered.

Scully heard a choking sound from Dean’s direction.

“This one sure has a flair for the dramatic,” Mulder said softly as he nudged her and smirked.

“What are you doing here?” Dean asked as he walked up next to Scully, apparently recovered.

Castiel narrowed his eyes and seemed to examine them all. “I told you,” he stated. “I’m here to warn you not to persist in your interference.”

“Okay, let’s say I buy what you’re selling,” Mulder said, “and believe that you’re some kind of celestial being doing the biding of the bearded old man in the sky who seems to communicate mostly with schizophrenics and big haired preachers – what does any of that have to do with Sam’s abduction or our family?”

“Your theology is peculiar and inaccurate,” Castiel replied. “It is enough for you to know that it is God’s Will.”

This exchange was not going well. Scully put a hand on Mulder’s arm to quiet him and took a step toward the angel.

“Castiel, I am a person of faith,” she said. “I know that God does not discourage questions, or even doubts. If we are made in his image, then the creator endowed us with the ability to reason. Surely you understand why we are unsatisfied with your explanation.”

For a long few moments Castiel seemed to consider her request.

“I will explain,” he said simply.

In an instant, Scully found that they had been transported to a homey looking diner. Somehow the four of them were seated at a table, complete with cups of coffee at their places and a generous slice of key lime pie in front of Dean.

“What the…” Dean muttered, expressing all of their sentiments.

“I thought you would like to be in a comfortable environment for our discussion,” Castiel explained, turning to face Dean who was positioned awkwardly close at his right side.

“All right now tell us what’s going on,” Mulder demanded.

Castiel turned back to address them.

“Many of your people erroneously interpret the _Revelation to John_ in a literal sense, presuming that the Apocalypse will entail horsemen, a whore, and the rise of an Antichrist,” he said without emotion. “In fact, the end of humanity as you know it is precipitated by invasion and colonization by an extraterrestrial race.”

“Holy shit, the Apocalypse??” Dean dropped his fork and gaped. Scully felt about the same.

“Go on,” she urged.

“I’m stationed in the garrison that oversees the Earth,” Castiel continued. “But there are many others. For a long time we have accepted that the end of this world would come by way of beings from another. But all is not lost. There are those among you who have negotiated with the colonists.”

“The Syndicate,” Mulder said.

“Yes,” Castiel said. “These men arranged for your race to continue in a hybrid form. Your son Sam is the result of their experiments.”

“But Sam is _our_ child,” Scully interrupted. “Mine and Mulder’s! I performed the DNA tests myself!”

“Then you have seen that in addition to the genetic material inherited from his parents there were also markers you could not explain, new base pairs that are entirely foreign to your planet.”

Scully knew this to be true. Castiel correctly interpreted her silence as confirmation and continued.

“The colonists wanted to create a docile population, a remnant of humanity that would be pliant to the will of their overlords,” he explained. “Instead, the Syndicate engineered the children of Sam’s cohort to develop many of the abilities of the extraterrestrial invaders without the susceptibility to the virus that will soon overtake your world and transform you into slaves for their service. The colonists learned of this betrayal, and that is why they are now collecting the hybrids.”

Castiel paused, but the three of them were too stunned to respond.

“What the colonists and the angels of the other garrison do not know, however, is that we have a plan to restore your race,” he said. “When most of humanity has been extinguished and the remainder sapped of its initiative, we will begin a genetic engineering program of our own that will bend the evolution of your species back toward its present state. That is why we need Dean.”

“Me?” Dean asked. “What the hell has this got to do with me?”

“I told you,” Castiel replied. “We have plans for you. Sam has been identified as the most successful product of the hybridization experiments. We anticipate that his genetic material will be the basis of whatever modified virus the colonists develop. Because you are siblings, your DNA is the closest to Sam’s. We will use it to create our own virus that we will introduce to the slave population over time. Its compatibility should increase its chances for success. Over many generations, humanity will recover.”

He looked at them with some kind of satisfaction, as if he what he had just said made all the sense in the world.

“You see,” he concluded. “Destruction will reign over the Earth, but a kernel of the righteous will survive – the spirit of your ‘Apocalypse’ if not literally what is written.”

“This is total crap,” Dean spit out.

Castiel looked at him, surprised.

“You act like this is no big deal!” Dean yelled. “Like we should just sit back and watch while ninety percent of humanity goes down the drain! Well, I say the cost is too high! I don’t want anything to do with your dick plan to promote future humans from slaves to semi-sentient cattle, you know, maybe someday if we’re really good and eat all our vegetables and pray to Jesus like good little girls and boys. No, it’s not enough!”

“I don’t understand why you resist what can’t be changed,” Castiel said. “This is the way it must be.”

“Well I say we fight the future,” Mulder interjected.

Castiel looked around at all of them, confused by their rebellion. Scully was still thinking about one point that bothered her.

“You say that _God_ told you to do this?” she asked.

“Well, not exactly…” Castiel replied.

“What do you mean ‘not exactly’?” Dean asked.

“Uhh… no one has spoken directly with our Father in some time,” Castiel explained. “Well, no one that I know of. These orders come from higher up, of course.”

“And you trust them?” Scully asked.

“Implicitly,” he answered.

“Maybe you should use that God-given brain of yours and think for yourself, Cas,” Dean commented. “Or were angels not given reason like humans?”

“I’m a multidimensional wavelength of celestial intent,” Castiel said angrily. “And you should show me some respect.”

He glared at Dean mere inches from his face.

“Oh, what are you going to do?” Dean taunted, not backing off. “Toss me back in the canyon?”

Castiel was fairly seething now. Scully tried to think how to ease the tension so they could work through the situation. Before she could say anything, however, they were transported unceremoniously out of the diner. She found herself sitting in Dean’s Impala with her son in the driver’s seat and her husband in the back. There was no sign of the angel.

“Goddammit!” Dean yelled.

Scully gave him a look.

“Sorry, Mom,” he apologized sheepishly.

“In all my years on the X-Files, that was one of the weirdest encounters I have ever had,” Mulder stated.

Scully just sighed.

“What are we going to do now?” Dean asked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “But first let’s go home, rest a little, have some non-celestial coffee and pie, and then figure out where to go from here.”

“Works for me,” Dean said and cranked up the engine.

~*~

> _George Hale has entered the conversation._
> 
> George Hale: _Need information._
> 
> George Hale: _I know you guys are out there._
> 
> George Hale: _Come on._
> 
> George Hale: _What do you know about the Russian vaccine I took to Antarctica?_
> 
> George Hale: _Have there been successors?_
> 
> George Hale: _Hello?_
> 
> George Hale: _Hey Frohike, if you help us out I’ll send you a nudie shot of Scully._

“Not likely,” Scully scoffed and made a face at Mulder.

“Still nothing?” Dean asked from across the room.

“Nope,” Mulder answered. “They’re probably mulling over the security risk, maybe getting more information before they reply.”

“Let’s go over what we do know,” Scully suggested.

“Okay,” Dean picked up. “Sam is Neo, E.T. has activated the invasion, and a ridiculously attractive angel wants us all to just back off so he can use my DNA for post-apocalyptic gene therapy.”

“‘Ridiculously attractive’?” Mulder questioned, looking at Scully.

She shrugged and nodded.

“Whatever you say,” Mulder said. “We have several outstanding questions – One, where is Sam? Two, how do we get him back? And three, how do we stop the invasion?”

“No small order,” Scully observed. “Castiel seemed to think the Syndicate was still up and running. I thought they had all died. We could follow up on any known contacts in case we missed someone?”

“We could look for signs of their activity – genetic research companies, dark money groups, any kind of suspicious shit,” Dean suggested.

“Nah, they’ll be too deep underground for that,” Mulder said.

“Maybe not,” Scully said. “With the advancement in colonization, they may be forced to be more conspicuous than usual.”

“I’ll troll the CSIS reports,” Dean offered. He opened up his laptop and got to the task.

Scully sighed and leaned back on the couch. She tipped back her glass and took down a long drag of merlot.

“There were several factions,” she mused to Mulder. “We don’t have any idea of their internal politics at this point.”

“You think we could align with one of the rebel groups?” he asked.

She shrugged and reached for the wine bottle. He passed it to her.

“I wouldn’t know where to begin,” she said.

Mulder looked thoughtful. He filled up his wine glass too and leaned back and put an arm around her. She sighed and fell back comfortably into his embrace. Maybe if she closed her eyes for just a moment it would all fade away.

“I think I found something,” Dean announced.

Scully opened one eye. “Really?” she asked, unconvinced.

“I’m not sure, but it does fit the criteria of shady as hell and related to genetics.”

Curious now, she sat up and motioned for Dean to come over and join them. They scooted over on the sofa and he sat down next to her.

“See this guy Carter,” he said, pointing to an open case file on the screen. “He worked for Biogen Syntec – pretty high up too – until they found him in a remote part of the Nahatlatch wilderness _on Christmas Eve._ No apparent cause of death listed, but they don’t suspect foul play.”

“That _is_ suspicious,” Mulder commented. “Maybe you could get the body transferred to UBC to do the autopsy.”

“Under what pretense?” she asked.

“Looking for some holiday pay?” he suggested. “Claim you knew the guy from med school? I’m sure you’ll think of something.”

He smiled and patted her on the back. She rolled her eyes.

“Okay, I’ll go make some calls.”

~*~

It had seemed like a long shot, but the body of one Dr. C. Carter of Biogen Syntec was yielding more leads – and puzzles – than Scully could have anticipated.

It was not, as it had first appeared, a run-of-the-mill heart attack from a yuppie caught over his head hiking in the harsh Canadian wilds. In fact, if she had to make an early evaluation, it seemed that he had suffered some kind of heavy metal poisoning _._ His internal organs showed all the signs, but she was still waiting for the results of the toxicology report.

Her phone rang just as she was marking her last comments on the autopsy report.

“Scully,” she said.

“You’re not going to believe this,” Mulder said on the other end. “But I did some digging into this company’s past – guess who’s on the board?”

“C.G.B. Spender.”

“Nope, it’s C.G.B. – hey, how did you know?”

“That cockroach just can’t seem to die.”

“What do you think they could be working on that would cost this man Carter his life?”

“I hope to have that answer when I get back the tox report. As a matter of fact, I think an e-mail just came through. Hold on.”

She checked the notification on her phone and, sure enough, the report was attached. Thank god for rush orders and Canadian efficiency. She put the phone on speaker while she opened the document and scrolled through the results.

“Hmm… negative, negative, below detection limit…” she said to herself.

“Fascinating,” Mulder said.

“Okay here we are,” she announced. “Wow, Mulder, this is – I don’t know what this is!”

“What?”

“He _was_ poisoned. The levels here far surpass anything one could survive. And the toxin itself is…”

“Yes?”

“ _Magnetite_.”


	4. Hail Mary Full of Grace

“This is like a front for a shell corporation set up by a dummy organization that's really a sketchy dark money PAC determined to elect the next alien president,” Dean complained.

“Not making much progress tracing Biogen Syntec then?” his mother asked.

“I’d have more luck finding a virgin in a Vegas strip club,” he groaned. She sent him a disapproving look. “I mean, yeah, no dice.”

He slammed shut his laptop and let out an exasperated sigh.

“Maybe we should try a different approach,” she said.

“If you’re thinking of investigating magnetite moguls – I already thought of that and it didn’t get me any further,” he said.

“No...” she replied. “What about Castiel?”

“What about him?” he asked, sitting up straight.

“I know he was towing the company line when he last spoke with us, but he does seem to like you,” she said. “Maybe if you called him up, he would be more helpful this time.”

“Hah,” Dean scoffed. “I don’t think he _liked_ me. More like wanted to chop me up into base pairs and serve me to the Borg.”

“Mmhmm.”

“What? And anyways,” he continued. “Even if I wanted to – which I don’t – how would I contact him?”

“Ah, now for that I have an idea.” She walked over to the side table where she’d left her purse and started digging around in it, looking for something. After a moment she pulled out what looked like a dull colored string of Mardi Gras beads.

“Here,” she said, putting the beads into his hand. “Do what everyone else does when they want to commune with the beyond – pray.”

“Oh come on,” he griped. “You waited for Dad to go out for groceries to bring this up, didn’t you? No disrespect, Mom, but this is horse crap.”

“Did you or did you not have first hand contact with an angel of the Lord?” she challenged him.

“I don’t know – ”

“Yes, you do.”

“I don’t even know what to say! I never memorized my Hail Mary touchdown pass or whatever.”

“That doesn’t matter. Just speak from the heart and it will come naturally.”

“Ugh, _Mooom_.”

“I’ll leave you alone so you can have some privacy.”

“Jesus Christ!”

“Yes, just like that. Only you might want to ask for Castiel first.”

Dean groaned as his mother left the living room and shut the door softly behind her. What was this? She was treating him like he’d just brought home a cute classmate for the first time and _wouldn’t they like some pizza rolls_ and _oh I’ll just be in the sitting room if you need me_ and _I won’t embarrass you at all except I totally will_. Ugh.

“Um…” He stood up to address the empty room. He rolled the beads nervously in his hands. “I pray to Castiel, pompous dick angel of the Lord, to get his feathery ass and sex hair down here right now.”

He looked around. Nothing. “See!” he announced to no one. “I told you it wouldn’t – ”

“What do you want?” the suddenly materialized angel asked him sternly.

“Shit!” Dean cursed and stumbled backwards, bumping the back of his knees on the sofa.

He quickly regained his balance, if not his cool, and looked back at the grumpy but oddly endearing fellow staring him down from a foot away.

“I, uh, we, um – ” Dean struggled to come up with a reason to engage the angel’s aide. “We need your help.”

Castiel looked at him blankly and subtly adjusted his posture, as if he were about to take off in flight again.

“No, no, wait!” Dean called. “ _I_ need you, please.”

Castiel seemed to consider this for a moment then minutely relaxed his stance. Dean took in a big breath and prepared to make his case quickly before the angel disappeared.

“I know you think your plan is for the best, but I just can’t accept that,” Dean started to explain. “You gotta understand, it’s personal for me. Sammy’s my brother, not just a pawn in some dick’s master plan – I can’t just stand by and let them probe and prod him. He’s a good kid! He’s gonna go to law school and become a public defender for poor folks who can’t afford it because he’s always had a big heart like that. And he’s in love with this sweet girl, Jess, and they’re gonna get married and have lots of obnoxious vegetarian babies in the ‘burbs. He’s a total bitch sometimes, and god knows there have been times when I wanted to disown him, but I love him – I, I’m human, I can’t help it. And he’s just one person out of the billions of people on this planet that don’t deserve to die. There’s got to be another way, Cas! Nothing is inevitable! Is there anything – _anything_ – you can do to help me stop these sons of bitches? _Please_.”

Dean stood there holding Castiel’s gaze for what seemed like an eternity. Finally, he spoke.

“Dean, if I stray from my orders, there are those above me who can cut me off from heaven,” he said. “And then I’ll be of no use to anyone.”

Dean felt his heart sink. So he wasn’t going to help them.

“I can’t just pop in and take you to River Falls, for example,” he continued.

Dean looked at him curiously.

“…or anywhere else you might like to vacation,” Castiel said slowly. “Just so you know why it is I can’t help you.”

He looked at Dean slyly. If he didn’t know better, Dean would have said there was even the beginning of a smile on the angel’s lips.

“Thanks, Cas,” he said.

“Good luck.”

Castiel disappeared accompanied by the sound of ruffled wings.

Not ten seconds later the door to the living room opened again and his mother leaned in from around the corner.

“River Falls?” she asked.

“Yeah, I assume he means River Falls, Oregon.”

“Where you and Sammy were a few summers ago?” his dad asked, his head appearing above Dean’s mother’s as he popped up around the corner too.

“Yes, geez,” Dean replied. “Would you just come in already?”

His parents gave each other a look and walked in to join him. Dean let out a breath and tried to will away the tension that had sprung up in his body since his mom had handed him her rosary. He passed the beads back to her as soon as she was close enough.

“Okay, I think I know what Cas was talking about,” Dean started to explain. “River Falls is where me and Sam ran into that Croatoan virus a couple of years ago… the virus that he was somehow immune to…”

“Of course!” his dad exclaimed.

“What?” Dean and his mother asked in unison.

“How could we have missed it!” he continued. “The Croatoan virus, the black oil… they’re the same! That’s why it didn’t affect Sam!”

“You think the colony at Roanoke was wiped out by an alien virus?” his mother asked.

“Why not?” his dad replied.

“Wait, wait,” Dean replied. “Why would the colonists or the Syndicate or whoever release black oil in some podunk town in Oregon?”

“It could be a kind of trial,” his mother suggested. “An experiment to test the effects on a closely monitored sample group before expanding to the wider population.”

“If that’s the case,” his dad picked up. “There may be a research station there – perhaps Castiel mentioned it because that’s where the abductees are being held.”

“It’s worth investigating,” his mother agreed.

“Okay, I’ll try to find out if there is a Biogen Syntec facility in the region,” Dean said. “Even if it’s not listed online, it could still be there. I’ll call Charlie too and see if she can help hack us some ID badges or something to get in.”

“Good idea,” his dad said. “Let’s get packed up and go!”

“Don’t forget your passport,” his mother instructed.

“ _Mooom_ , I know.”

~*~

The sun had already set by the time they crossed into Oregon. As they got closer and closer to River Falls, they noticed an increasingly festive attitude among their fellow travelers. They passed several music blaring, creatively decorated RVs, motorcycles, and an old Volkswagon bus heading in the same direction. At first they assumed the revelers were headed to a different destination. But when they were nearly run over by a retrofitted school bus with “ _We welcome our alien overlords_ ” painted on the side, they became more suspicious.

“Maybe they’re listed in the new _Lonely Planet_ under ‘best places to get stoned or also possibly abducted’,” Dean’s dad said.

“It’s going to be harder for us to avoid notice with this circus going on,” his mother noted.

When they arrived in town, they immediately came upon a large field where dozens of vehicles had come together for some kind of celebration. Dean parked the car and they wandered among the partiers. They saw people in wild attire from green alien suits to sequins and tutus and even somebody in what must have been a Wookie costume. One truck had set up speakers and was playing R.E.M.’s “It’s the end of the world as we know it” at top volume. The music was getting some competition from across the field, however, where a rival was broadcasting “Let’s party like it’s 1999”. His mom winked at his dad, but Dean didn’t want to know why.

A guy sitting at a table surrounded by an assortment of signs with messages like “We come in peace” and “Elvis was a Timelord” seemed to be a leader of sorts, so they strolled up to get some information.

“What’s going on here?” his dad asked the man, a scruffy looking fellow probably in his mid 30s who was wearing a MUFON baseball cap and smoking a joint.

“UFO party!” he replied. “Name’s Fenig.”

“Mulder,” his dad replied. “No party like a UFO party! But why are you having it here?”

“Oh, ‘cause of the UFOs, of course,” Fenig replied.

“What UFOs?” his mother asked.

“The ones that, like, have been buzzing all over this place for weeks now,” Fenig replied. “Oh hey, sorry, man, I’m being so rude! Want a toke?”

“I’m good, but I think Scully here would like a little something to help relax, eh?” He smirked and nudged her.

Dean’s mom did not look amused, by either the offer or the entire UFO party situation. “No, thank you,” she said firmly.

“Hell, I’ll take it,” Dean said glibly. Fenig passed the joint over then started rummaging through a box of stuff under the table.

“A ha!” he called out. He reemerged with a bright green headband that had bouncy spring antennae attached to it. “For the little lady.”

“Ohh I don’t think so,” Dean’s mom said.

“I can’t let you leave empty handed,” Fenig insisted. “It’d be bad manners, and we have to show our new alien friends what a generous and sharing community we are so we can embark into the Age of Aquarius together.”

“Yeah, Scully,” his dad chimed in. “It’s only polite.” He took the alien antenna headband from Fenig and arranged it on her head. When Dean saw her glowering out from under it, he all but collapsed in giggles.

“Ahahaha haha ha… oh god I think that’s enough,” he said and passed the joint back to Fenig. “Thanks, man.”

“Anyways,” his mother said loudly. “Do you know where these alleged UFOs are going? Is there a landing spot or a facility of some sort?”

“Uhh I dunno about landing,” Fenig answered. “But there’s this top secret government base or something about a mile west. That’s where they’re making the next gen microwaves that emit E.M. waves we can use to communicate with the E.B.E.’s.”

“Microwaves?” she asked.

“Yeah, man, ‘cause they’re, like, telepaths.”

“ _O-kay_ I think we need to go now.”

“Thanks for your help,” Dean’s dad said and shook Fenig’s hand.

“Anytime, brother!”

They headed back to the car and Dean’s mother pulled off the antenna headband as soon as they were out of sight.

“Really, you can’t believe that anything that man said is remotely reliable,” she said irritably as they climbed into the car.

“What, you don’t believe you’re receiving cosmic messages along with your popcorn?” his dad teased. She just sent him a grouchy look.

“Well let’s go see what’s a mile west,” Dean said and cranked the engine.

It took a little bit of driving around – and it was more like three miles than one – but eventually they came upon a high security facility that seemed like a likely contender. A cursive B&S logo on the side of the building was the final giveaway.

“Biogen Syntec – here we are,” Dean said as they pulled into the parking lot.

“Let’s hope these IDs work,” his dad said.

“We shouldn’t all go in at the same time,” his mom advised. “It would look suspicious.”

“Since Charlie added a meeting to the company calendar, they should be expecting people,” Dean said.

“Still, one of us should go in first in case we don’t pass security.”

“I’ll do it.”

“Dean – ”

“I’ll be fine!”

“Just put on some glasses.”

Dean left his parents in the car and strolled into the front lobby, trying to project ‘corporate’ with every powerwalk step. It was a large building and reminded him of a hospital or other medical facility. He scanned the scene - there were two elevators in the back of the lobby, halls in both directions, and a security desk to the right with what looked like a sign-in clipboard. Dean pulled out his ID badge and affixed it to the front of his suit as he walked over to the desk.

“Evening,” he said nonchalantly, not bothering to look at the guard. He checked his watch and filled out the sign-in sheet: _Jan 18 7:56pm, Will Riker, Conference Room B._ He prayed the security guard wasn’t a Trekkie and simultaneously thanked and cursed Charlie for getting them access. The guard spared a bored look for the log entry and Dean’s badge, told him the conference room was on the 3rd floor, and immediately went back to playing Angry Birds on his phone.

When the elevator doors closed a minute later, Dean let out a sigh of relief. He sent a quick text to his parents letting them know he’d made it through. He noted that the elevator had buttons for six floors plus a basement and subbasement – that sounded promising. He hit floor three just in case the guard could track that kind of thing, but turned into the stairwell as soon as he exited.

“Restricted access, authorized personnel only,” he read off the door leading into the subbasement. “Bingo.”

He peered out cautiously. Empty hallway. He decided to take his chances and walked out like he owned the place. Always better to pretend that you belong and other people will rarely question it. He passed several doors to various kinds of science labs fully pimped out with advanced chemical and biological research equipment. Another door seemed to lead into a meticulously climate controlled room housing an array of supercomputers. Finally he reached a set of double doors with no window, no label, and a keypad restricting entry. It might as well have had a big red target sign painted on it.

Dean didn’t think he’d be able to bullshit his way into access this time, so he elected not to try unless he really had to. He settled into an empty lab across the hall with the door slightly cracked to wait for an opportunity.

About ten minutes later, the double doors opened and two scientists in white lab coats walked out, talking to one another. Dean knew the doors would close again before they got far enough away for him to scurry across and avoid notice. So he waited until they had taken a few steps, aimed carefully, and threw a credit card across the hall. Perfect hit! The plastic card wedged into the door hinge, preventing it from closing fully. As soon as the scientists rounded the corner, Dean leapt out to retrieve it and slid quietly into the restricted room.

What he saw when he entered amazed him. The room was dimly lit, but even so he could tell that it was enormous – the size of a high school gym at least. He heard low whirring and clicking noises emanating from multiple directions. Banks of electronics were distributed in islands around the room, their displays lighting up with charts and numbers that meant nothing to Dean. Along the walls were what looked like large, upright pods. He could see flashing red, blue, and green lights in the cavities, but not much else. He stepped closer to one to get a look at what was inside… it was people!

A young woman in her early twenties stared blankly out of the nearest pod at Dean but did not seem to register that he was there. Electrodes were taped all over her head as well as on her chest, wrist, and upper thighs. Could these be the abductees?

Dean half jogged around the room, scanning the pods, looking for Sam. Finally he found him in the back corner. Gently, Dean pulled off the electrodes till his brother was completely unwired.

“Sammy?” he asked, shaking his shoulders gently. “Can you hear me? It’s me, Dean. We’ve come to take you home. Sammy??”

Sam looked around dully. A thousand thoughts of what the abductors might have done to scramble his brain went through Dean’s mind.

“Dean?” Sam asked suddenly. He blinked and looked Dean in the eyes.

“Ohthankgod,” Dean sighed and pulled Sam in for a quick but tight hug.

“Let’s get the hell out of here,” he said.

“But what about the others?” Sam asked.

“Shit, I dunno, man,” Dean said.

“We can’t just leave them!” Sam insisted.

“Okay, okay.” Dean pulled out his phone to text their parents: _Need transport for 12. Ideas?_

A few moments later a reply came in: _Ok. Wait 10 minutes._

Dean didn’t have any idea how they were going to get out of this mess, so he was just going to have to leave it up to his parents and work on getting all the other kids disconnected.

By the time they had unhooked the last captive, ten minutes had already passed.

“Okay, everybody, listen up,” Dean addressed the small crowd in a stage whisper.

“I don’t know what’s waiting for us outside, but we’re gonna get you all safely out of here, okay?” he said. “You’re gonna be very quiet and take the stairs up to the first floor. They open onto a hallway, not the main lobby, so you can exit the building through a side fire door. If anyone tries to stop you, use your judgment. If they’ve made you, just make a break for it and run to the parking lot. We’ll cover for you. All right?”

Eleven nervous faces nodded back at him. Dean couldn’t blame them for being scared. Hell, he wasn’t feeling too confident either. But they’d come so far, and he had Sammy back now – if they could just squeak by a little longer, it might all be okay.

Dean led the kids up the stairs and down the hall to the exit, Sammy taking up the rear.

“Here goes nothing,” he muttered and pushed open the door.

“What the…” he heard Sam say behind him. Dean’s mouth fell open and he didn’t even attempt to explain. A big yellow school bus drove right up to the curb and opened its door.

“All aboard!” his dad called out from the driver’s seat.

The kids all rushed to get on the bus.

“Does that say ‘We welcome our alien overlords’?” Sam asked.

“Yeah… just get on the bus,” Dean replied and pushed him forward.

As soon as they were up the short stairs, their dad punched the accelerator without even a pause to pull closed the doors.

“Sammy!” their mom called out from one of the front seats.

“Mom!” He embraced her and lifted her clear off the ground in his excitement. A sharp turn on the bus had them falling back into the seat and giggling.

“Good to see you, son!” his dad called back. “You’ll understand if I can’t hug you just yet.”

“Uh oh, Dad, I think we’ve attracted some attention after all,” Dean said and pointed to two armed men who were running to intercept them at the exit of the parking lot.

His dad cursed. The two guards planted themselves in the middle of the road with their guns out. High brick walls on either side of the exit blocked any alternative escape.

“You can’t just run them over,” his mom warned.

“I know, I know, damnit.” His dad slammed on the brakes hard. The men opened fire on the bus.

“Everybody get down!” Dean yelled.

Suddenly, a man appeared in between the two on the road. He put a hand on each of their heads and immediately brilliant white light shone out of their eyes, ears, and mouth. After a few seconds, they collapsed on the ground.

“Holy shit!” Sam exclaimed.

“Is that Cas??” Dean said.

The man in the road straightened up. It _was_ Cas. He lifted the two guards as if they were no more than sacks of rice and tossed them aside. An instant later, Cas materialized next to Dean on the bus.

“What the hell was that?” Dean demanded.

“Smiting,” Cas replied evenly.

“Did you just kill them??”

“No. Those were demons. The human souls that originally inhabited their vessels had already passed on.”

“Demons? They’re working with angels _and_ demons??”

“That appears to be the case. I suggest you vacate the premises before more arrive.”

Everyone had stopped to gape at Cas, but now Dean’s dad shot a look at his mom and turned on to the highway.

Dean sat down in the seat behind him and Cas followed suit.

“So, are you, um,” Dean wasn’t sure how to ask Cas what he had in mind. “Is there a human soul in there with you too?”

“No,” Cas responded. “This vessel formerly belonged to a man named Jimmy Novak. He consented to pass it on to me as he was dying of cancer. His soul has moved on to heaven now.”

“Good,” Dean said. Cas titled his head and eyed him curiously.

“Because I want to thank you – and just you – for saving us,” Dean said. He looked deeply into Cas’s eyes. Confusion and maybe even interest looked back at him. All of a sudden, Dean took Cas’s face in both his hands and leaned in and planted a warm, passionate kiss on his lips.

When he pulled back, Dean’s heart was thumping in his chest. He wasn’t used to losing his cool like this. Still, he tried not to betray his feelings as he looked at Cas for a reaction.

At first, Cas just looked back at him with no change in his expression. After what seemed like an eternity, he licked his lips and smiled just a little bit. “You’re welcome,” he said. Then, as suddenly as he had appeared, he vanished again.

Dean grinned and leaned back against the bus seat.

“I take it I missed a few things?” Sam said teasingly.

“Shut up, bitch.”

“Jerk.”

Dean thought he had never been so happy to be insulted in his life.


	5. Stock up on Kryptonite

Scully checked the mirror to make sure she had spread the green cleansing mask evenly over her face. She felt exhausted, but happy. They had returned the bus to Fenig at the UFO party and handed the abductees over to enthusiastic, if paranoid, volunteers to bring them back to their respective homes. It was nearly dawn by the time they got back to their own house. She had snoozed in the car, but it wasn’t enough. In five more minutes she would wash off the mask and crawl into bed and, if at all possible, sleep till spring.

“I think you missed your ship,” Mulder said. From behind his back he pulled out the alien antenna headband and stuck it on her head.

“Oh I don’t think so,” she said and tried to snatch it off.

“Ah ah ah – it’s cute! And it matches!” He put a hand in her hair, holding the headband firmly in place.

She struggled to get away, but only half-heartedly. She tried to send Mulder one of her no-nonsense glares but ended up ruining it with giggles. Without letting go of the headband, he leaned down to press a big kiss on her mouth.

“You’ve got green on your nose!” she laughed when he pulled back.

“Mmm what a tragedy,” he murmured. “Maybe we should both take a shower to get it all off.”

“Oh no, no, I’m going to bed!” she insisted. She turned back around and turned on the sink.

“Okay, whatever you say,” he said, apparently giving up.

She ran a washcloth under the water and raised it to her face to start washing off the mask. But instead of leaving the bathroom, Mulder stayed standing behind her. Slowly he reached around her waist and untied her silk robe in the front. She raised an eyebrow and sent him a questioning look through the mirror. He feigned innocence.

The warm water felt good on her face, scraping away all the mess and dirt of the day, but she barely noticed it. All she could concentrate on were the warm hands that were brushing her skin now, pulling back her robe, caressing her slowly from her hips up her side and to her breasts. She hummed contentedly as she mechanically wiped away the last spot. A sudden pinch to her nipple brought her firmly back in the moment.

“Hey!” she protested. She turned around to face Mulder and batted his chest to push him off.

“You want me to go away?” he whispered in her ear as he leaned over her. He wrapped his arms around her and lifted her easily, placing her back a bit so that she was seated on the counter.

“Umm… no…” she admitted breathlessly between kisses.

For weeks they had felt so weighed down by Sam’s abduction. She had had no appetite for this kind of intimacy. But now the tension had lifted and she was surprised by how much she missed it. Sleep could wait a little longer.

She broke the kiss and pulled Mulder’s shirt up over his head. As soon as it was off, she moved on to unzipping his pants.

“You’re eager,” he said.

She pulled his pants and boxer briefs down.

“I’m not the only one,” she commented.

Mulder just chuckled and kissed her some more. His tongue roamed her mouth, playfully and passionately by turns. She felt his hand slide up her back, rubbing her skin tenderly. Too tenderly. She wrapped her legs around his waist and roughly pulled him closer. The surprise caused him to pause his kisses, so she leaned forward and nipped him lightly on the bottom lip.

“If that’s how you want it…”

Suddenly he tilted her backwards, supporting her with the hand on her back. He pushed in all at once and she couldn’t help but let out a low moan.

“The kids will hear you,” he warned.

“I don’t care,” she breathed.

“Yes, you do,” he countered.

“They’re sleeping,” she said.

He was holding her pressed up against him, still for the moment. He smiled and kissed her long and slow. When he finally started to move, she couldn’t help but make little blissed out noises. She really didn’t care.

When she came a few minutes later, she leaned into Mulder’s shoulder and let out a muffled shout. He followed her over seconds after then leaned forward with his forehead against hers after he pulled out, panting softly.

Suddenly he chuckled.

“What?” she asked.

He raised a hand above her head and boinked one of the springy alien antennae.

“I’m still wearing that?” she asked in disbelief.

“Mm yes,” he said. “Finally fulfilled my biggest fantasy.”

He smiled at her mischievously.

She just rolled her eyes and hopped down from the counter.

“I guess we’ll keep it then.”

~*~ 

“Ahh I love it when the kitchen turns into a bio lab,” Sam announced as he strolled in.

“Geochemistry today,” Scully replied. “But I promise the coffee and bagels are untainted.”

She smiled cheerfully at her son – it was _so good_ to have him back – and returned to swirling some sodium bicarbonate in a wine glass. They had already had a chance to catch up on the drive back from Oregon. Sam remembered very little of what had happened to him, and Scully couldn’t help but count that as a blessing, even if it meant he had no useful information to share.

“Can I help?” he asked between bites.

“Tongs,” she instructed. He passed her the salad tongs. “Thanks. Also, could you find those little, round rare Earth magnets you and your brother always loved to play with? You’d make them into chains and cubes and other geometric patterns. They’re very strong.”

“I think they’re on my old dresser upstairs,” Dean said as he entered the kitchen.

“Oh, good,” Scully said. “Coffee and bagels are on the counter, Dean.”

“You sure you kept breakfast entirely separate this time?” he asked. “No nitrazine in the mug or flesh eating bacteria in the cream cheese?”

“It’s fine,” she promised.

“May I ask what you’re looking for?” Sam said.

Scully dropped some dark liquid from a food dye dropper onto a thin glass sheet then spread it carefully with a barbecue brush.

“Remember that Biogen employee who died of magnetite ingestion?” she said. “I took some of his blood when I performed the autopsy.”

“Ooo Mom, breaking the law! Living on the edge!” Dean teased.

“Yes, well, he won’t be needing it,” she said. “My hypothesis is that he was trying to self-inoculate but erred in the dose or composition.”

“You think he was testing out a vaccine on himself?” Sam asked.

“That’s what I’m trying to find out,” she replied. “And if so, what went wrong and can we learn from it.”

She put the slide under the microscope lens and adjusted the focus.

“The magnets?” she asked.

“Oh, right.” Sam hurried off and leaped up the stairs in what seemed like three big steps and promptly returned with the toy magnets.

Scully held the magnets off to one side of the microscope. Just as she had suspected.

“It’s ferromagnetic, all right, but the compound is metastable,” she continued. “I expect Dr. Carter tried to introduce some kind of stabilizing agent which had unforeseen consequences.”

“Ehh fascinating,” Sam said. “So, what’s Dad up to?”

“Oh he had another case,” she answered.

“Dad took on another case? Now??” Dean asked in disbelief.

“We do have jobs, you know,” she replied. “It’s just a straightforward psychic remote viewing case. Some poor soul’s remains buried in the snow, I think. I’m sure he’ll have it wrapped up by this evening.”

“Sounds boring,” Dean said.

Scully nodded in agreement. She was much happier investigating the alien vaccine.

As the day wore on, she made considerable progress in understanding how the vaccine had been intended and why it had gone wrong, but not on how to fix it. She was sipping some tea in the living room pondering how to proceed when she noticed that the laptop had a flashing message on the screen. She picked it up to examine it.

> Arthur Clarke: _did u get our txt?_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _We have important information to disclose._
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _it’s about the vaccine_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _Are you there?_
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _CHECK UR PHONE_
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _if he sees that he won’t need to read the text saying get online_
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _whatever_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _We’ll wait for another ten minutes then disconnect._

Scully didn’t know how long it had been since that last message, but she wasn’t going to wait to find out.

> _Evelina Hale has entered the conversation._
> 
> Arthur Clarke _: oo we got the little wife_
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _what are you wearing?_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _Where’s George?_
> 
> Evelina Hale: _On a case. Remote location. Poor reception._
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _We have some information concerning the vaccine you inquired about._
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _the ruskies never finished theirs_
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _but there are new players in town_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _The Chinese._
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _we think they r trying 2 weaponize the virus_
> 
> Evelina Hale: _How do you mean?_
> 
> Robert Heinlein _: it looks like they’ve come up with a virus of their own_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _A clever distribution method that can be pulverized for airborne release._
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _unfort it doesn’t work either_
> 
> Robert Heinlein _: their records show they abandoned the project after several failed trials_
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _We’re sending you files from their research in case it may be of use to you._
> 
> Evelina Hale: _Thank you._
> 
> Isaac Asimov: _Congratulations on getting Sam back._
> 
> Evelina Hale: _How did you know about that?_
> 
> Arthur Clarke: _how do we know anything?_
> 
> Robert Heinlein: _stay sexy_
> 
> _Isaac Asimov has left the conversation._
> 
> _Arthur Clarke has left the conversation._
> 
> _Robert Heinlein has left the conversation._

Scully checked her email and sure enough there was a message from "Asimov" with a large zip file attached. It opened to dozens of documents containing hundreds if not thousands of pages. In Chinese. Well, at least there were diagrams. She picked up her cup of tea and settled in to go through them.

~*~

“I can’t believe I’m doing a blood transfusion with a rat,” Sam said.

“It’s a mouse,” Scully corrected. It had taken her a few days to get the gist of the Chinese research, but in the end it had been worth it for the idea it had precipitated.

“You really think this will work?” Sam asked. He was sitting in her lab with a needle in his arm, squeezing a stress ball to increase blood flow to the IV bag she’d set up.

“Would you rather I try the virus on _you_?” Scully countered. She came over to check his progress.

“That’s enough,” she announced and helped unhook him from the tubing.

“Now, don’t exert yourself,” she instructed. “Would you like me to go get you some orange juice? Or maybe something to eat? I could go for some pizza myself.”

“Nah, let’s just get this over with before someone finds us,” he replied. They had come to the lab in the middle of the night, but it was still best to hurry in case some poor, sleep deprived resident or janitor happened in on their odd little experiment.

She hung up the bag and attached a new, smaller needle. Next she inserted it into the sedated rodent. She felt a bit guilty subjecting the squeaky little fur ball to what would probably be a fatal test, but such was the price of medical research. If their scheme worked, that little mouse could save billions of human lives.

“How’s Jess doing?” she asked while they waited.

“Good, glad to have me back in one piece,” Sam replied.

“I’m sure,” she said. “When we told her you were missing, she wanted to come back from her holiday trip, you know, but we told her more hands on deck wouldn’t have helped much.”

“Yeah, I appreciate that,” Sam says. “She knows that there are some weird things about our family, but I haven’t broken to her just how weird…”

“If you want her to spend her life with you, you owe her that honesty,” she advised.

“I know,” Sam sighed. “I’ll tell her soon. I’d just rather an alien abduction not be what breaks the news to her.”

“Understandable,” she agreed. She checked the mouse. “I think the transfusion is complete. Ready to test the virus?”

“No reason to wait,” he said. Scully put on latex gloves and Sam brought her a syringe and the vial of experimental vaccine they had brought from home.

She had been able to determine from the diagrams (and liberal use of Google Translate) how to modify the magnetite vaccine she’d isolated from Carter’s blood into an aggressive viral form. They should be able to follow the instructions to enable airborne distribution, too, but first they needed to test the virus on a host containing the alien DNA.

She inserted the needle and emptied the syringe into the laboratory mouse. Sam hovered over her, anxious to observe a response.

At first, the mouse continued to sleep peacefully. But after a few minutes, the animal suffered violent convulsions. Scully looked up at Sam meaningfully. The spasms were short-lived and soon the mouse fell still.

Scully brought her stethoscope to the little creature’s body. No heartbeat.

“It worked,” she said, amazed.

“That’s good?” Sam said hesitantly.

“Well, not for the mouse,” she admitted. “But, yes, this is very, very good news. We have a way to resist the invasion!”

~*~

“I’d like to raise a toast to your mother,” Mulder announced later that night, holding up a glass of champagne in their living room. “Special Agent, medical doctor, extraordinary woman, and now savior of humanity!”

“Hear hear!” Sam called out.

“Cheers!” Dean joined in.

“Now, boys, I wouldn’t go that far,” she cautioned. “But we have made some very promising progress.”

“Just drink your champagne and enjoy the moment!” Mulder said, poking her teasingly in the side.

They all raised and clinked their glasses. Scully tipped back her head and downed the bubbly treat in one swig. When she looked back down, she was startled to see two new men standing in the room with them.

“Castiel?” she said. But who was that old man with him?

Before she had a moment to consider, Mulder had let his glass drop and shatter on the floor and roughly pushed the intruder up against the bookshelf.

“Why can’t you just die, you cancerous son of a bitch?!” he yelled into the man’s face. The man exhaled a puff of smoke in Mulder’s face.

“Spender!” she said, realizing who the man was. “What are you doing here? And how in the hell did you not only survive, but get out of your wheelchair?”

“The angels have seen fit to show me mercy,” he replied smoothly. “Well, angel, anyways.”

She turned to Castiel, fuming. “I demand an explanation, right now.”

“If you’ll release me,” CSM interrupted. “I’d be happy to fill you in.”

“Maybe I’ll just dig a grave out back and fill _you_ in,” Mulder growled.

“Mulder,” Scully said, warningly. “Let’s at least find out what’s going on.”

Mulder removed his arm from across CSM’s chest and stepped back reluctantly.

“Thank you, Scully,” CSM said. He calmly brushed smooth the front lapels of his suit and took another drag of his cigarette.

“What, no champagne for me?” he asked with mock disappointment. He walked casually across the room toward Sam. “After all, I am the true savior here.”

Without warning, he took a small device out of his pocket and pressed it onto Sam’s upper arm.

“Ow!” Sam exclaimed. “What the hell!”

“You leave my son alone!” Scully yelled. “What have you done to him?”

CSM looked at the pager-like device, checking something.

“Oh just following up with the subjects of our little program,” he said. “All seems to be in order.”

“What have you done to him??” she repeated.

“Improved him,” he replied. “You see, the colonists are aware of the hybrids and _will_ collect them again. They passed them off to us again so we could fix our, eh, ‘mistakes’ from earlier – make them compliant and remove their extra abilities. Tell me, Sam, have you been able to psychokinetically move anything since you returned? Have you had any visions or veridical dreams?”

“Uhh, now that you mention it… no,” he answered.

“As I expected,” CSM continued. “But I said we improved you, and we have. A new gene has been introduced that, when activated under certain future conditions, will re-enable your strengths but with an added penchant for violence. You will experience an irresistible desire to commit extreme acts of rage – against the colonists, of course. We’re using their own request for mindless automatons against them. It’s brilliant, if I do say so myself.”

“What, you’re using me as a Trojan horse against the invaders? Dulling my mind so I won’t even be conscious of what I’m doing?” Sam asked angrily.

“Did you know about this?” Dean interrupted suddenly. His question was directed not at CSM, but at Castiel.

“We don’t have a lot of options,” Castiel replied carefully.

Scully saw the heartbreak written all over Dean’s face and felt terribly for her son. Angel or not, no one who hurt her son stayed in her good graces.

“Get the hell out, all of you!” she shouted.

“As you wish,” CSM said. “Our check-in is complete. We’ll be seeing you.” Castiel walked over to him, apparently ready to beam the both of them out of there.

“That’s it?” Dean demanded. “You’re just gonna disappear again instead of face up to what you’ve done?”

“Your mother asked me to leave,” Castiel replied.

She just glared at him angrily, arms crossed.

In an instant, they were gone.

She went over to her younger son and gave him a quick hug. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah, I think so,” Sam said.

“Are you, Dean?” she asked.

Dean just shrugged and looked sad. Mulder cursed and stormed out of the room. Scully picked up the bottle of champagne and sipped straight out of it. So much for their celebration.


	6. Love in the Time of Colonists

Dean kicked a pebble across the front yard. He felt like breaking something. Or going for a drive. A fast drive. With loud music. He eyed Baby in the driveway and started to walk over.

Suddenly Cas reappeared in front of him, blocking the way.

“Back already?” Dean asked, surprised.

“I, uhh, wanted to explain,” Cas said sheepishly. “You were right – about me leaving when things get uncomfortable, I mean. So… I’m not.”

“Okay,” Dean said, crossing his arms. “Well?”

Cas swallowed and looked down, around, and generally anywhere except at Dean’s face.

“My superiors are suspicious of me,” he said. “They believe my interference at River Falls demonstrates dangerous tendencies…. tendencies toward emotion, doubt, even rebellion. They wanted to reassign me, but I couldn’t let that happen now.”

“Why not?” Dean asked.

“I’m doing this for _you_ , Dean,” he said, looking up at him intently. “I don’t want the Apocalypse! If I were removed, your new guardian would use you in the plan I told you about.”

Dean wasn’t really sure what to say to that. “Okay, but how did you end up with that Cigarette Smoking son of a bitch?”

“I needed to make new allies,” Cas continued. “If the Syndicate and I work together, and we are successful, I will be in a position to influence events after the invasion. I can guide them, prevent them from taking direction from the other angels who do not have your best interests in mind.”

“You really think that’s going to work?” Dean challenged. “You think you can just call up the Devil and ask him to play nice?”

“This has nothing to do with Lucifer,” Cas said, confused.

“It’s the same thing! To our family, that man _is_ the Devil!” Dean shouted. “Do you have any idea what he put my parents through already? Of course you do – you’re an angel! You know this isn’t right.”

“It’s for the greater good,” Cas insisted.

“Oh yeah? Then why didn’t you tell me you were planning this, huh?” Dean said. “Why ambush us all of a sudden only when you couldn’t keep your secret any longer?”

Cas didn’t respond.

“That’s what I thought,” Dean said bitterly. “This is bullshit and you know it. If you had just come to me, we could have figured something out together! We’ve been working on a new vaccine – Mom and Sam just tested it tonight. We’ll figure something out, like we always do! What we _don’t_ do is go making deals with the goddamn Cancer Man!”

“You’re right,” Cas admitted despondently. “I should have talked to you before… I – I didn’t want to burden you with my problems when you were focused on Sam.”

“Maybe so,” Dean said. “Or maybe you didn’t want to hear what I had to say. Maybe the thought of being Mr. Big Hotshot in Heaven once the dust clears in the post-Apocalypse was pretty appealing.”

“Dean,” Cas continued. “I don’t know what to say. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry doesn’t really cut it,” he replied.

Cas looked at him so sadly that Dean nearly relented. But he was still burning with anger and the hot pain of betrayal. No, Cas would just have to earn his trust back.

Out of nowhere Cas closed the difference between them and grabbed Dean by the shoulders and kissed him.

“What the hell, dude?” Dean pushed him off and stepped back. “It does not work like that!”

He wouldn’t have thought it possible, but Cas looked even more miserable now. He stared at the ground, shoulders slumped, completely dejected.

“I’m sorry, so sorry,” he said. “I don’t know how to make this right.”

“Jesus! That much is obvious!” Dean chuckled lightly, wiping his mouth. “I’m not _that_ easy, you know.”

Cas didn’t respond to Dean’s attempt at levity. Probably didn’t understand it. Dean sighed.

“Look, I know you were just trying to do what you thought was right,” he said. “Maybe you can help us with our plan. It’s not too late.”

Cas looked up at him, hopeful.

“Mom has the magnetite virus thing she’s been working up,” Dean continued. “But we’ve still got to figure out how to get it to the colonists.”

“Yes,” Cas said eagerly. “Yes, I can help with that.”

Dean gave him a small smile and clapped him on the shoulder. “Well then, let’s get to work.”

~*~

The rest of the family was probably a bit surprised when Dean walked back into the house with Cas and announced that he wanted to help, but, to their credit, they hid it well and welcomed him without another word. Dean could tell his mother was worried about him, but he appreciated that she trusted his judgment and was letting him deal with it.

They caught Cas up to speed quickly enough then set about divvying up tasks. Since it turned out Cas could read Chinese, he volunteered to go through all the research files. Dean and his mom would work on aerosolizing the virus. Sam and their dad would start acquiring supplies. They left a message for The Lone Gunmen in case they came across any leads. And finally, Dean called up his closest and most dependable friend.

“Charlie! How wonderful to see you!” He heard his mother call out in the front hallway.

Dean dropped what he was doing and leapt up to greet her. She fairly pounced on him when she saw him, wrapping her arms around him and squeezing tight.

When she pulled back she noticed the newcomer in their midst. “You must be Cas!”

“Yes,” Cas replied and stood up awkwardly. He reached out a hand to shake, but Charlie just took it and used it to pull him into a hug too.

“Dreamy” she mouthed at Dean over Cas’s shoulder.

He half-smiled half-grimaced back at her. He hoped she wouldn’t try to “help” his love life along the way friends with the best of intentions often do, though rarely to the desired outcome.

“Thank you again for getting us access to Biogen,” his mother said.

“You’re totally welcome,” Charlie replied. “How can I help now?”

“Well, Cas and Mom have got the virus pretty well covered,” Dean observed. “But to get it to the bastards we’ve got to track down the mothership. Any ideas?”

“Hmm…” Charlie sat down on the sofa and pulled out her laptop. “You say those guys used lightning flashes to identify the abduction sites?”

Dean nodded.

“Did the ship itself give off a traceable heat signature, maybe in the infrared?” she asked.

“Not that they detected or told us about,” he answered.

 “There’s probably no point looking for a visual ID,” she mused. “They’ve got to be hiding somehow or there’d be reports of sightings everywhere, and I haven’t heard anything more than the usual.”

“What if they’re over an unpopulated area?”

“They’d still be visible in weather satellites and military radar and stuff like that.”

“Maybe they’re involved in the conspiracy.”

“Unlikely – too many people have access to that kind of data… Hey, how about a gravity pattern? Did your guys look for that?”

“You can see gravity?”

“Yeah, check this out!” Charlie opened up her laptop and started typing. Dean came over to see what she had pulled up. “See, there are these paired satellites that detect minute variations in gravity all over the planet so they can measure stuff like sea level rise and how much the glaciers are melting.”

“Woah, that’s cool. In a depressing global warming kind of way,” Dean observed. “Can you hack into it?”

“‘ _Can I hack into it?_ ’ he says,” she repeated. “Please, I eat these NASA nerds for breakfast.”

“That’s my girl!” Dean beamed. Things were finally looking up.

~*~

It took the better part of a week, but to Dean’s amazement, the pieces continued to fall into place. Charlie was 90% confident she’d located the ship hidden under the sands of the Gobi desert. His dad and Sam had come up with an impressive cache of magnetite ore and other uncommon materials needed to assemble the aerosolized virus. And Cas… well, Cas was sticking around and trying his best to help with every single little thing from translating Chinese to cleaning his mother’s glassware to burning toast in a pathetic attempt to serve breakfast. It would be kind of annoying if it weren’t so endearing.

In the end, it all came down to one last obstacle to enacting their plan: how to get the virus to the colonists.

“I’ll transport myself onto the ship and release the aerosol,” Cas volunteered.

“Like hell!” Dean said. “They’ve got angels of their own – you’d be outnumbered. If you just jump aboard, guns blazing, they’ll take you out before you have a chance.”

“I’ll do it,” Sam announced. “You heard the Smoking Man – they’re going to come for me anyways. If I’m going to be a Trojan horse, I might as well take the virus and do it our way.”

“No way,” his dad said.

“Absolutely not,” his mother added.

“Come on, you know it makes the most sense,” Sam argued.

“We are _not_ going to lose you again,” his mother insisted.

“Besides, how do you know they won’t just activate your Rambo gene the second you get up there?” Dean asked.

“Oh thanks a lot, Dean, I guess I’m just too big of a freak for you to trust me with this,” Sam said.

“Hey hey, I didn’t mean it like that,” Dean said, trying to be conciliatory. “I just don’t want those sons of bitches to get their clammy Reticulan paws on my little brother.”

Sam looked grumpy, but relented. “I suppose you think you’re the one for the job?”

“Of course,” Dean replied, grinning.

“And exactly how is that going to work?” his dad inquired.

“Well that part I haven’t figured out yet,” he admitted.

“I have an idea,” Cas announced. “I could contact the angels guarding the colonists and tell them I have Dean as my prisoner. His genetic material is valuable to them. I will offer to turn him over in exchange for asylum from my own garrison. If the rumors of my disgrace have reached them, they will have no reason to suspect the sincerity of my offer. They’ll allow me to board and I’ll take them unawares. ”

“Oh no,” his mother said. “You may tell them whatever you like to get inside, but you had better not actually take my son and use him as bait.”

“But Mom, if they see that I’m not there, the whole gig is up,” Dean argued. “I have to go. It’s a good plan. Plus, I can carry more of the virus.”

“I don’t like it,” she said. “Mulder?”

Dean turned to his dad who seemed to be considering.

“I don’t like it either,” his dad said. “But I doubt we’ll come up with a plan that doesn’t involve some risk. I think it’s the best shot we’ve got.”

Dean looked back to his mom. She looked more worried then ever, but finally she nodded her acquiescence.

“Alright then, let’s go!” Dean announced.

“Not so fast, kiddo,” his dad cautioned. “First we’re going to go over every detail, come up with contingencies for every possibility, test out the aerosol again, get you properly outfitted, and most importantly, give me and your mother a couple of hours to come to terms with letting you go on this mission.”

“Okay,” Dean replied. His dad didn’t show his emotions as expressively as his mother generally did, but looking into his eyes then, Dean thought perhaps it was his dad who was the most worried for him after all. “We’ll be careful, I promise. Let’s make sure we do everything right.”

And so it was they found themselves parked in a field well outside the city the next morning. Dean had driven himself and Cas over in the Impala while Sam has taken their parents in his ridiculous little Prius. They wanted to test the virus distribution system in the open air one time before leaving. When all the evaluations were done and everyone’s concerns satisfied as much as they could be, Dean turned to his family to say goodbye.

“To quote the Walrus, _‘the time has come’_ ,” he said.

“What walrus?”

“Forget it, Cas.”

“Good luck,” Sam said, stepping forward and giving Dean a hug. “I believe in you.”

“Thanks, Sammy.”

“Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do,” his dad said, coming forward to get his hug.

“Does that even eliminate anything?”

“I always said angels were watching over you,” his mother said. “Do you remember that? When you were a little boy. I didn’t think it would turn out quite so literal.”

She took Dean’s head in her hands looked into his eyes, then hugged him tight for a long time. When she finally let go, she turned to Cas. “You watch out for him,” she instructed. “Watch out for each other.”

“I’m coming back, Mom,” Dean tried to reassure her.

“I know,” she said. Though there were tears in her eyes, she smiled at him, trying to show confidence.

“You’re very fortunate to have such a loving family,” Cas said to him softly.

“Don’t I know it.”

Dean felt much more nervous than he wanted to let on, but adrenaline was beginning to take over. He smiled and looked back at his family one last time, then turned to Cas and nodded. Cas put his hand on his shoulder and immediately the world shifted.

~*~

A hot blast of air nearly knocked Dean over before he had time to adjust to his surroundings. Sand scraped his face as he tried to shield it from the wind.

“So this is the Gobi Desert,” he observed. “Lovely. I’m shocked no one lives here.”

“The living conditions are quite inhospitable, Dean,” Cas replied.

“When we get back, I’m gonna educate you on human use of humor,” Dean said. “There’ll be a curriculum with required viewing of everything good, from Charlie Chaplin to the Blues Brothers.”

“Uhh, okay,” Cas agreed. “Shall I contact the foreign angels now?”

“No, let’s just stand in the sandstorm for awhile.”

“I take it that is more use of ironic humor and you actually mean the opposite.”

“Just call up the angels already.”

“I already did.”

“What, just then? While we were talking?”

“We communicated telepathically, yes. They are about to lift off and advance their invasion. They said I can transport aboard with my prisoner once they are airborne.”

As soon as Cas finished explaining, Dean felt the ground begin to tremble. About a kilometer away – not near far enough, if you asked him – he saw the desert sands pour forward as something massive began to rise from beneath. The enormity of it was breathtaking. It just continued to rise and rise – as tall as a city skyscraper. And the width of it! It must have been as wide as the downtown of a small city too. He’d had no idea the size of it when it had been obscured in the dark over Mount Crickmer.

Dean felt something squeeze his hand and looked down to see Cas’s fingers entwining with his own.

“To be ready to beam onto the ship,” he explained.

“Err, right…”

Looking up at the massive ship that was now above them, Dean did feel somewhat comforted by Cas’s presence. He squeezed his hand back and braced for transport.

Everything around him changed again. The inside of the alien ship was not what Dean had expected. Well, he wasn’t sure he had expected anything in particular, but if he had, it wouldn’t have been this. It looked so… ordinary. Pale blue lighting provided minimal illumination of dark hallways. It seemed they had landed in an entry hall of some sort, kind of like the transporter room in _Star Trek._

Two figures approached from the shadows. As they came into focus, Dean could hardly believe his eyes. He’d seen a lot of weird monsters in his day, but aliens? This was new! They were about four feet tall, light grey in skin tone, with large heads, and anime sized eyes.

“The magnetite!” Cas whispered.

Dean reached into his pockets and got out a modified grenade. He quickly pulled off the tab and tossed it into the air. When it exploded over the approaching aliens, flakes of magnetite fell all over and around them. Immediately they began to clutch at their heads and chests. They collapsed on the floor, writhing in apparent pain. One of them made an odd series of noises, a combination of hisses and guttural clicking sounds.

“Is he talking?” Dean asked Cas.

“Yes.”

“Do you know what he’s saying?”

“He’s calling me a traitor.”

“Wait, are those the angels? But they look like aliens!”

“No, these are just minions who have received instructions from the angels – fortunately for us, since the magnetite would not impair the angels. But of course they look the same – what kind of vessels did you think they would take on?”

“I don’t know, man, let’s just deploy the virus before the creepy aliengels show up.”

Dean scanned the room for something like an air duct with access to the ventilation system of the ship. Instead of a vent, there appeared to be one long slit going all along the top of the wall where it connected – or rather, didn’t connect – to the ceiling.

“How the hell does that architecture even work?” he wondered aloud.

“You’ll have plenty of time to ponder the architecture of their jail cells if you don’t hurry!” Cas called out.

Dean sprang into action, taking out several small canisters loaded with the aerosolized virus. He popped the seal off of one of them and tossed it into the vent over his head. He could see Cas doing the same across the room. He distributed a few more in the transporter room, plus a couple in the adjacent hallway for good measure.

“Do you think it’s working?” he asked Cas.

Just then a loud alarm started blaring and the blue lighting changed to red.

“I’d say so,” Cas replied. “Time to go.”

Cas took Dean by the hand again and they were gone.

Dean squinted as the bright sunlight shocked his eyes. He was surprised to see they were standing on a beach.

“On the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido.”

“Japan! Weren’t we just in Mongolia?”

“It’s a fast ship.”

Dean looked up and saw the massive saucer in the sky. It was surreal to see it exposed like this in daylight. It seemed to be having trouble maintaining its altitude. The longer he watched, the more clear it became that the ship was malfunctioning. Their virus was having an affect.

“Oh shit, what if it crashes on a city?” Dean asked, the sudden thought striking him with horror.

“Its trajectory is toward the Sea of Okhotsk,” Cas assured him.

As they watched, the ship suddenly fell into a rapid descent, all appearances of control lost. Dean held his breath in anticipation of the crash. He hadn’t even realized he was still holding Cas’s hand until he felt a reassuring squeeze.

The ship hit the water with an incredible sound of groaning machinery and crackling supports. Dean looked out over the water, which seemed to ripple toward them.

“Hmm, a tsunami may be a concern,” Cas stated.

“What?!”

An instant later, they were back in the field in Canada. It was empty now except for the Impala. Dean leaned against the car and laughed.

“Woo how about that! Nice timing, Cas! Wow.” He couldn’t stop grinning. They’d done it! Cas looked pleased too. Hell, that little smile he was making was probably akin to hysterical laughter for an angel. Dean pulled out his phone and texted his parents the good news. Immediately his phone started buzzing with replies asking for more information. He just tossed it onto the ground. They could wait.

He went up to Cas and grabbed him by the tie, pulling him forward into a hard pressing kiss. Teeth bumped against teeth and Dean remembered to stop smiling and focus on the lips and tongue. Finally he pulled back to catch his breath.

“Is that ‘how it’s done’?” Cas asked.

“Hell yes!”

Dean took Cas by the shoulders and spun him so he was backed up against the car. He leaned into him as he ran a hand along his cheek and jaw and continued to kiss him. At first Cas was a little awkward and sloppy, but he soon picked up the art of it and returned the kiss with skill and passion. Dean wasn’t sure if Cas had done this kind of thing before. Frankly, he didn’t care. All that mattered in that moment was how he was about to debauch the irresistibly sexy angel up against his car.

His other hand trailed down Cas’s chest then wandered to the side, sliding into the warm space between his shirt and jacket. He found his hipbone and grabbed hold of it, pulling Cas forward gently and grinding into him. Cas moaned into his mouth. Dean abandoned it and trailed kisses down his neck and sucked the soft skin where it met his shoulder.

Cas gasped and clutched the front of Dean’s jacket in both hands. A moment later he was running his hands everywhere – up and down Dean’s chest, his back, up under his shirt – frantically touching and pinching and moving on. He jerked Dean impossibly closer and rubbed up against him furiously.

“Woah, slow down,” Dean whispered. God knows he was just as eager, but he wanted this to last. He took each of Cas’s hands and held them back against the car. He continued the slow kisses up the other side of Cas’s neck, leaving a little hickey here and there, nibbling lightly on an ear, until he made it back to his mouth.

As he deepened the kiss, Dean released Cas’s hands and pushed the trench coat off his shoulders. Thinking ahead, he tossed the coat onto the hood of the car. Next went the jacket. Then Dean slowly undid his tie. With his hands freed, Cas went back to touching Dean, but unhurried now. Dean felt a cold blast of air as his shirt hiked up, then long fingers caressing his back, pressing into his skin, a thumb buffing where the bone of his hips protruded.

Dean let Cas remove his jacket, then the flannel, and finally lift his t-shirt over his head. Dean couldn’t help but shiver. It was unseasonably warm (thankfully), but still quite cold for this kind of outdoor activity. He didn’t care though, didn’t want to wait. He just wanted to feel that warm skin against his own.

He began to unbutton Cas’s shirt, working his way down from the top and kissing his chest as he descended. When he got to the end, he untucked the shirt and undid the belt buckle. He could see the fast and shallow rise and fall of Cas’s whole chest and abdomen. Cas leaned back with his weight against the car. He carded through Dean’s hair where he crouched. Dean ran a hand up the inside of Cas’s thigh then lightly over the bulge in his pants. Cas clutched his hair, pulling a little, then relaxed again.

Dean unbuttoned and unzipped Cas’s pants, letting them fall to the ground. Next he slid down his boxer briefs. Cas gasped as his bare ass touched the cold metal of the car behind him. Dean adjusted his scrunched up shirt for him so it provided a modicum of insulation. Cas still seemed a little tense. Well, he’d just have to help him relax. So, he licked his lips and got to it.

The quiet little moans of pleasure Cas made as he went down on him were beyond tantalizing. Before long, Dean was so achingly hard that he didn’t think he could stand it a second longer. He stood up and kissed him deeply. Their hands roamed all over, like they could never be satiated. Dean never wanted to break contact.

“Damn, the lube is in the glove box!” Dean muttered as he realized he’d have to go get it.

Cas put the bottle in his hand without pausing his kisses.

“How did you…?”

“Angel, remember? I can be fast when I want to be.”

Dean laughed as he kissed Cas’s neck.

“Agghh that tickles!” Cas yelped. He grabbed Dean by the shoulders and swung him around, switching their positions. Dean’s back banged into the side of the Impala.

“Oh no you don’t – ” he started to protest.

Cas shut him up with his mouth and held his wrists together in one hand over his head. With Dean thus immobilized, he reached down with his other hand to stroke Dean’s crotch. This aggressive side of Cas was so hot that Dean thought he might come in his pants if he didn’t do something about it. So he bit Cas on the lower lip to distract him then broke free again.

“Ow!”

“Don’t worry, I’ll kiss it better,” Dean promised. He pulled Cas to him and started walking backwards till they were in front of the Impala. Suddenly Dean pushed Cas down so he landed sprawled out on his back on the coat on the car’s hood. (He’d known that coat would come in handy.)

Quickly he discarded his own pants and popped open the bottle of lube. He crawled onto the hood of the car over Cas and began to make preparations. It didn’t take long before he felt Cas was ready.

“Okay?” he asked. He looked into those bright blue eyes with pupils blown wide. His gaze was so intense, so caring and lustful all at once. Cas nodded and Dean pushed in.

They broke eye contact as Cas threw his head back and gasped.

“Still okay?” Dean asked.

“Mmmm….”

Dean pushed in the rest of the way and held still for a moment, panting. The feeling of bliss was nearly overwhelming. Here he was, falling head over heels, they’d just saved the world, and he was literally inside an angel. Was his life awesome or what?

“Dean…”

“Yeah, Cas?”

“Please move. _Please_.”

“Happy to oblige.”

Dean looked down at Cas as he started up a rhythm. He stroked his hair and smiled at him affectionately. Cas held him by the shoulders, pinching so hard it hurt. He arched his back and rolled into Dean’s motion. It was intoxicating. Every bit of friction – hips against thighs, lips against lips, fingers caressing down his spine then squeezing his ass – it was too much and yet he wanted more. As his heart raced faster and his breathing became ragged, he picked up the pace of his thrusts.

As he got close, Cas pulled Dean’s head down and kissed him hard. When they both came within moments of one another, Dean could have sworn he saw stars. Or was that a halo?

For a while after, they lay stretched out on the Impala, breathing heavy, happy.

Dean could hear his phone vibrating angrily with all the missed calls and texts from his family.

“I guess I should get that.”

“Yeah,” Cas said. “But they know you’re okay. They can wait for details while…”

“While what?”

Cas smirked mischievously and clambered on top of him to give it another go.


	7. Epilogue: Hips Before Hands

The afternoon of their baseball game in Seattle months later was warm and sunny.

Mulder explained to the group that the seats he’d gotten on the third base line were the most coveted since right-handed hitters tend to hit the ball to the left side of the field and they could see any action at the plate.

Scully did not appear overly interested in this tidbit of information, but accepted one of the gloves Mulder was handing out – “prime territory for foul balls too!” – all the same.

To their right, Sam and Jessica were laughing and talking as he pointed out to her the mascot, scoreboard, dugouts, bull pens, etc.

“This is so American!” she exclaimed excitedly. She had dressed up for the occasion in a mid drift jersey with shorts, knee socks, and a baseball cap perched on top of her curly blonde hair. The sun glinted off the newly reset diamond ring on her left hand.

Next to them, Dean was showing Cas the roster and stats in the program. Cas listened to Dean’s lecture seriously.

“Here, take this scorecard,” Dean instructed. He leaned over Cas and started to draw on the paper with a pencil as he explained. “Each of these numbers represents a position, see? One is the pitcher, two is the catcher, three is the first baseman, and so on… When the batter hits the ball, you mark down whether he got a hit or, if he was out, which fielders made the play.”

Cas looked up at him, confused. Dean leaned in closer so they were touching and directed Cas’s line of sight toward the field. “So, let’s say your guy hits the ball there to short stop – that’s the one between second and third base – and the short stop throws it over to first base before the runner can get there, that’s a 6-3 and you mark it down like this. If he flies out to center, that’s an F8. Get it?”

Cas didn’t really get it, but he nodded anyways. “What if it’s a ‘hit’?”

“Excellent question. A single is a 1B and you draw in the line from home to first on your scorecard here. A double is 2B, triple is 3B, homerun is HR, you get the idea. If the runner scores, you make a circle around the whole diamond,” Dean said.

“That makes sense,” Cas replied, pleased to be catching on.

“Oh and of course a walk is a BB and a strike out is a K,” Dean added.

“Of course…”

“Hey who wants some hot dogs and beer?” Mulder interrupted.

He called over one of the wandering concessions boys and passed out the ballpark food.

Cas looked positively blissful as he finished his second fully loaded frank.

“You are enjoying that entirely too much,” Dean teased. “Save some room for dessert.”

“Dessert?”

“Yeah, do you want deep fried dough covered in powdered sugar, or sticky air-blown strands of neon-colored sugar?”

Cas’s eyes widened as he spotted the pink and blue cotton candy tray weaving through the section below them. “ _That_.”

Sam grimaced. “Gross.”

“Oh have some fun, Sam!” Jess chided.

“I just remembered some confectionary related torture from my abduction experience. It would be too traumatic – ”

“Liar!” She hit him lightly on the arm then called over the cotton candy kid to pick up a few of the treats.

“Any interesting cases coming up?” she asked between chomps of sugar. Sam had finally filled her in on the family business and she had taken it well. She even wanted to help! Not having had the same training as the rest of them, she was starting out by assisting with research.

“I think there might be a shape shifter outside Calgary,” Dean replied. “Saw some suspicious stuff on a file that crossed my desk last we – ”

He cut off as the batter connected with a pitch with a loud crack and sent the ball barreling right toward them. With a sense of impending doom, he realized his hands were full of hotdogs and candy and he had no time to react.

Just in time, a glove appeared in front of his face. The ball hit the leather with a smack.

“Mom??” he said, surprised.

“Well done!” Sam called out.

She beamed proudly as the other fans seated near them applauded her catch.

“I taught her how to play baseball,” Mulder bragged.

“Excuse me, you taught me how to bat,” Scully corrected. “Catching the ball is a mere exercise in calculating the trajectory – basic physics!”

“Did I ever tell you boys about the alien baseball player X-File?” Mulder asked, changing the subject.

“Yeah yeah, Exley of the Roswell intergalactic league,” Sam said with a yawn. Jess smacked him.

“I want to hear about it,” she said.

Dean and Sam looked at each other and rolled their eyes.

“So nice to have someone who isn’t tired of my stories,” Mulder said with a smile. “Exley fell in love with the game and decided to stay on Earth. That’s how powerful baseball is!”

“What happened to him?” Jess asked.

“Oh he was killed some by some racists,” Mulder answered. “Died in the arms of someone who loved him, though.”

“Great, thanks for the cheery story, Dad,” Dean commented.

“Well, I do have some positive memories associated with that file,” Mulder said with a wink at Scully.

“Ughh _Daaad_ ,” Sam and Dean complained in unison.

“There are some alien baseball players still today,” Cas announced suddenly.

“What, really? Who?” Dean asked.

“Not ones you’ve heard of,” Cas replied. “The famous ones are mostly humans who made deals with a crossroad demon.”

“Kinda like _Damn Yankees_ , eh?” Dean asked.

Cas looked at him blankly.

“Okay, adding another movie to the watch list!”

“Oo there are lots of good baseball movies,” Mulder commented. “Don’t forget _The Natural._ ”

“ _Bull Durham_ ,” Sam added.

“ _Angels in the Outfield_!” Jess called out.

“Haha that’s perfect for you, Cas!” Dean said, laughing and nudging him in the ribs. “What else? _Field of Dreams_!”

“There’s no crying in baseball,” Scully said.

“Good one, Mom! That’s from _A League of Their Own_.”

“Dean, if you keep adding movies to your list faster than we watch them, I’ll never catch up,” Cas said. “Especially since once you put them on you don’t seem interested in actually watching them with me.”

“Hey sshhh too much information,” Dean scolded, blushing slightly. He was glad it had gotten dark. He coughed and quickly changed the subject. “Hey, ah, almost time for fireworks! Just three more outs left.”

The Mariners had a solid lead and just needed to close out the top of the ninth to end the game and start the celebrations.

“You know, Jess, Sam really loves fireworks,” Scully commented.

“Oh is that so?” she asked, turning to him. Sam shrugged and nodded.

“When they were kids one year, Dean begged and begged me to surprise Sam with fireworks for American Independence Day,” Mulder said. “It was a pain to find them since we were living in Canada, of course, but Dean insisted.”

“It was pretty awesome,” Sam said.

Dean smiled thinking back on the memory, one of his favorites.

The Mariners’ closer was one of the best and had made quick work of the first two batters. The audience stood in anticipation of the last out of the game. When the umpire called out “ _Strike three_!” the crowd erupted in cheers.

Fireworks of all shapes, sizes, shimmers, and colors shot out from behind the outfield stands.

Jess leaned back against Sam’s chest contentedly. He wrapped his arms around her and rested his chin on top of her head as they watched the sky.

“Do you need to sit on my shoulders so you can see, sweetie?” Mulder joked.

Scully glared back. “I can see fine, thank you very much.”

He laughed and put an arm around her to pull her in against his side. They smiled at one another, then turned back to performance.

“I’m just glad the fireworks are the only lights in the sky tonight,” Dean said.

“They are lovely,” Cas said, sounding a bit awestruck. “One of the many ways that humans amaze me: turning a tool of violence – fire powder and explosives – into a work of beauty instead. I love to watch it.”

“I think they just look cool,” Dean said with a smirk.

Cas turned away from watching the display and kissed Dean warmly and slowly.

“Don’t you want to watch the fireworks?” Dean whispered. “Something about how you love to observe the beauty of humanity?”

Cas gave him a meaningful look.

“Oh,” Dean said. As Cas pulled him in for more kisses, Dean gazed at him, his face illuminated in shades of red, gold, green, and blue by turns as the fireworks exploded. The show in the sky really could not compare.


End file.
